Moving right along with our Developer’s Corner, I had the wonderful opportunity to interview James T. Nixon III, iXsystems’ Webmaster.
James was first introduced to Open Source and BSD by his friend from high school, Gary, who handed him a burned disc with the word “UNIX” written on it and told him to “install this on your mom’s computer.” Later on, James found out he could connect to the Internet with free open source and still be able to do a lot of what he wanted out of a computer with an old RC3 Mandrake Linux release. Soon after, James began to delve deeper into CSS coding and hacking. He used his self-taught skills to freelance design websites for local bands, artists, and photographers. He started working at iXsystems after he helped Matt Olander port a web template into Joomla and has been working here ever since.
James is currently involved in several projects. Right at this moment he is working on a website for AppCafe, the PBI installer for PC-BSD. It’s being built using a PHP framework, called CakePHP, instead of Django, the python framework. The main reason being there are a couple of PHP developers in the PC-BSD community, and James hopes they will be more comfortable contributing to the website if it’s written in a language they’re familiar with. To ensure the success of the project, James took it upon himself to familiarize himself with CakePHP tools. He then modeled the AppCafe database schema after a meta-data file listing for every PBI. He also mentioned that CakeApp had been an invaluable resource in the process: link.
In addition to AppCafe, James is also working on enhancements, documentation, and training for iXsystems’ production tracking system, SugarCRM. The team is trying to leverage the Community Edition with open source modules so it can perform Workflow Management, Reporting, and Project Management. James has also worked closely with William Grzybowski on this project and was a key player in developing the graphical user interface for Sugar.
A normal day for James at iXsystems begins with a fresh cup of coffee and checking the local IRC channel for the latest news. As the webmaster, he is responsible for updating web content, porting templates to Joomla, and designing graphics for SpreadBSD as well as handling miscellaneous web requests. During his years at iX, James has learned a lot about database design principles while adapting the serial tracking database schema for real world applications. This experience has helped shape the FreeNAS 8.x/TrueNAS 9.x web interface as those are built using the same technology.
Looking ahead, James is very optimistic about the future of FreeBSD and its related projects. He started using PC-BSD with version 1.5 and notes it has come a long way since then. Every new major release comes with enhanced features and usability. He also notes that the Warden utility has seen the most change over the years. One of the cooler features he has kept an eye on is the adoption of PBIs as a package format for plugins in pfSense and FreeNAS. He is confident that it will only be a matter of time before the pkgng command is replaced completely. As the FreeBSD project continues to evolve, James expresses his appreciation over the small enhancements. He notes that the small details all cumulate in a monumental change that drastically improves the user experience, and he is proud to be a supporting factor in the development team.
I would like to thank James for answering my questions and taking the time to help with this blog post. We’ll be taking a break from Developer’s Corner. As we look to a new year, stay tuned for a new series of blog posts!
Lisa Liang
Marketing Assistant
