Interview - Bard Farstad of eZ systems

Bård Farstad is the lead developer at eZ systems, the company behind eZ publish. As a PHP developer from a C++ background, he's pretty much done all there is to do with PHP. For this 25 year old programmer from Skien, Norway, coordinating an international development team and turning an Open Source software project into an enterprise-level commercial success was just a matter of adjusting his stride. Aside from the computer keyboard he's also a master of the guitar fret board. Ask him nicely and he might send you his band's latest single on mp3...

Following SitePoint's eZ publish series, I got in touch with Bård to find out more about life at eZ systems, his plans for eZ publish, and his insights on developing online with PHP.

Bård and eZ systems

SP: Can you tell us a little about yourself? What first got you into software development and what is your programming background? What got you into developing Web-based applications?

I first got into programming when I was about 15 years old. At that time there was an active demo scene, which I was an active member of. The demo scene is about programming graphical demonstrations with music, much like MTV videos. The programming language we used was Pascal with inline Assembler. After a while, when the compilers got better at optimizing code, I started to use C++, and became part of a group called Sorrox. At the same time I was studying electronics, which later progressed to computer engineering, from which I graduated in May 2000.

While studying I got interested in Linux. At the time there weren't many Linux companies here in Norway, so my brother, two friends and I decided to start a company: eZ systems. We started out as a consultancy with Linux and Open Source solutions as the focus. We later expanded to developing graphical applications using C++ and Qt. In 1999 we had a customer who wanted us to develop an ecommerce solution, so I started writing a Webshop during a vacation from my studies. This was the starting point for eZ publish, and we eventually released the first version of eZ publish in November 2000 under the GPL.

SP: When did you first come across PHP and what made you select it, over other technologies such as ASP and JSP or even Perl/CGI, for the development of eZ publish?

I first came across PHP when I created the Website for the Linux user group back in 1998, while I was studying. It was really quick to develop applications in PHP and the performance was also good. At the time, of the languages you mention, the only alternative that had been made specifically for the purpose of powering dynamic Websites was ASP. The fact that this was a closed source Microsoft product made my choice pretty simple.

SP: Did you have any idea back then what eZ publish was to become, and how successful it would be?

We had no idea that eZ publish would become so popular. The feedback from users has been overwhelming. I would never have guessed that it would become so popular, especially in such a short time.

SP: What made you decide to found eZ systems? What was life like at eZ systems the early days?

The basic idea when we started eZ systems was that we wanted to have a fun place to work. Our mission was simple, have fun and try to make a living. So when we started out it was mostly for fun.

SP: With eZ publish, eZ systems seem to have hit upon the perfect recipe for both Open Source and commercial success. Do you find this hard balancing act to maintain? Is there any general advice you can offer to developers and small companies considering a similar strategy for publishing their software?

It's very hard to balance. On the one hand, you want to make the best software you can, and on the other, you need to make money. I really don't have any advice except stay away from venture capitalists; they will try to push you into making too much money, too fast -- at which point the Open Source spirit will die.

SP: How do your customers respond to eZ publish being Open Source?

Very positively! Many customers demand that their solutions be open source, and of course the price tag is very attractive. The drawback is that some customers expect everything to be free, since eZ publish itself is free (GPL).

SP: Looking at the eZ systems partner list, there's an impressive collection of names, including Siemens and IBM. To what do you attribute this success?

There are a lot of companies working in Web development and eZ publish is a good toolkit with which they can create most dynamic Websites. They therefore want to partner with us to be able to deliver solutions based on eZ publish. After the dotcom crash, customers didn't want to pay too much for these kinds of solutions, so the companies delivering them have had to look for alternatives. As a result, more and more companies are choosing eZ publish.

SP: Do you find it is more difficult to gain support from Open Source developers given eZ systems commercial "alter ego"? What form of contribution do you like to receive for eZ publish? Is there anything you have planned or would like to see, to encourage further involvement in the product from the Open Source community?

eZ publish is perhaps not a traditional Open Source program, as it was written solely by eZ systems. We still get a lot of feedback from users; everyone from hobbyists to big companies like Siemens and IBM. We do have some external developers who send us their contributions -- typically eZ publish users who've patched a bug they've found. One of the best things about the Open Source feedback is it helps us track down bugs quickly.

We're finishing up the code for eZ publish 3 right now, which will be much more modularized and plugin-based. When we release it, I hope it'll encourage developers to write plugins that we can make available from our Website -- which will offer a third party download area where users can upload their plugins for eZ publish. We're now working on our new Website, which will be launched some time before the final eZ publish 3 release, to further stimulate involvement from the community.