Season 2, Episode #7: Building Open Source Packages in Umbraco with Nicholas Westby

 

Welcome back to Happy Porch Radio, season 2.

In this episode I speak to Nicholas Westby, an experienced Umbraco developer who works with a company called Rhythm Agency, in California.

Nicholas shares his story and that of Rhythm Agency.

Amongst many other topics we talk about the Umbraco form builder package he created – Formulate – and how the agency supported him in the development of this open source project.

It is really fascinating to learn about both his interaction with the wider Umbraco/open source community and the interaction of the Agency as a whole.

Image of Nicholas Westby

Nicholas Westby

Nicholas Westby is a lead full stack developer at Rhythm Agency and is the creator of the Umbraco form builder, Formulate. He’s built around a dozen Umbraco websites, including brands such as IGT, Jacuzzi, Celestron, BrandingBusiness, and AllCare Health among others.

Listen to the episode

Tune in to find out:

 

  • The slightly offbeat story of how Rhythm Agency got its start.
  • A handful of case studies where Nicholas built sites using Umbraco.
  • A little hint to anyone looking to undertake a massive Umbraco related project.
  • How Nicholas turned his frustrations into a super useful Umbraco package.
  • The story of Nicholas working weekends AND office hours on his passion / side project.
  • How Nicholas mustered up the momentum to get a viable package up and running years earlier than he expected.
  • A quick rundown of how to use Formulate (it’s simple to use, it only takes a minute to explain).
  • Nicholas’ motivation for spending so much time and energy thinking about Umbraco (it’s not because of the easy content entry).
  • Tricky question to ponder on: How many Umbraco sites do you have to work on to be considered an Umbraco developer?
Links mentioned in this episode: