Meta Q&A:
Ryan Battles

We're excited to get to know more of the amazing ExpressionEngine community - all over the world. This week we're in America's heartland, Colombus, Ohio, where we talk with the former high school computer teacher and present ExpressionEngine pro, Ryan Battles (@ryanbattles) of Jovia Web Studio.

MQ: Tell us about your work in 140 characters or less.

RB: I run Jovia Web Studio, an ExpressionEngine-focused agency out of Columbus, OH.

MQ: How/why did you get into the web industry? Why do you stick with it?

RB: I used to be a high-school computer teacher, and would teach my students how to design and build stuff for the web. I would also show their work while presenting at my state's educational technology conferences. A few times this led to people in the audience emailing me afterward to design websites for them or their schools, and before I knew it, I had a side business going. Eventually I left teaching in order to start Jovia Web Studio, named after a combination of my daughters' middle names (Joy and Olivia). 

I have stuck with the web industry mostly because of its continual challenges. As soon as you've gotten comfortable with one technology, API, or language, there's always something else that would be beneficial to know how to do. It's a challenging and rewarding field to be working in.

MQ: Why do you use ExpressionEngine?

RB: ExpressionEngine enables me to build useful features into my clients' sites quickly and easily. I also like the way that you can increase the system's capabilities by either writing add-ons or including PHP right there in the templates. I have also felt very privileged to be a part of this community, full of talented people that go out of their way to help each other out.

MQ: What was the first EE site you ever worked on? What was that experience like?

RB: My first website was for a school district in Cincinnati. I actually took the job not knowing how to build EE sites, but knew that EE had a solid reputation, and the features list was exactly what we needed for the project. It was a gamble that paid off well. While I would do the site in an entirely different way knowing now what I know about EE and the addons available, it was still a successful project that was well-received by the district.

MQ: What does a typical workday look like for you?

RB: I try to keep normal business hours between 8 and 5, with a handful of walks throughout the day. I work in the same office as Andy Johnson, another ExpressionEngine developer (and awesome designer), so we generally take short breaks to bounce ideas off of each other. The rest of that time is spent communicating with clients or developing their websites.

MQ: How do you stay passionate about your work? What do you do to refocus when you're having a bad day?

RB: To stay passionate, I try to keep side-projects going that allow me to stretch my abilities without the fear of client pressures. I also have been more selective lately about which projects I will pursue or accept. By doing this, I try to keep out those draining projects that suck the life (and passion) out of the job.

If I'm having a bad day, I try to take more walks or retreat for a few minutes to a nearby coffee shop without my computer. I find that getting away from the problems at hand and focusing on the big picture makes most problems seem more manageable. 

MQ: My favorite EE site I worked on is: _______ 

RB: Director-ee.com. One of my side projects with Andy Johnson, it was fun to be able to build and work on a site that is geared towards the ExpressionEngine community.

MQ: My favorite EE site someone else did is: _________

RB: ClimateCentral.org by eecoder and Antistatic Design. The site contains a lot of functionality to show what's possible with EE, but I love the multitude of interactive features on the site. 

MQ: If I could change one thing about ExpressionEngine it would be:

RB: The update process. At a very minimum, I'd love to see the config files and third party folders outside of the system directory, to make uploading the new version more streamlined.

MQ: If I had once piece of advice for someone trying to break into the web industry it would be:

RB: Be a "Jack of all trades, master of one." Any discipline in the web industry benefits from a working knowledge of the others, but the barriers to entry for this profession are relatively small, so you do need to excel at something in order to stand out from the crowd.