Interview with ******* by xenFrench.com

[Allan]

Interview with *******
______________

https://*******.com/
(165 resources on Nov 11,2014)​

Can you give us a brief bio?

You could see it in there: https://*******.com/about-us/



What activities do you do enjoy for relaxation?

We inspired our staffs by a great business culture. We create a fabulous environment where all of staffs from our company could join. Between each of working sessions, our staffs have 15 minutes to join an exercise breaks. All of us must enter this activity. We do not discriminate between boss or staffs…, even the team leader must join. It’s our rules. And we have a collective cookhouse where all of staff could have lunch together right in our company. And an amazing thing I would like to tell you that we think to ******* as the second family with us where all of us could take care for others like relatives.



Can you summarize your educational experience for us?

Well, all our staffs have minimum 2 years of experiences in developing on XenForo. And because of our culture, we just recruit who could fit with our mission and motto. Maybe they are not derived from prestigious universities over the world, however if they could satify our requirements, we accept to let them in.



Will you describe what you do on a daily and/or weekly basis?

It’s a very personal question, you know. As an administrator, first of all, I will check our site every morning to check out any requirements from customers, any complaints… or check our system for any requests. We usually plan our activities and all of operating works for years and detailed it for every years so we hope that it will be check frequently. At the end of a month, we send newsletters for our customers as well as anybody concerns.



Tell us about your time as Administrator on *******.com.

Well, like an admin, I usually check out all of our customer’s updates and solve out any problem happened.



What are the common mistakes you see Forum Administrators making?

Well, as usual, you could know that the big mistake is that by somehow your miss any customer’s requirements or complaints. It affects by our mission is service 24/7 so we hope to provide our best.



What Websites do you visit for fun and relaxation?

Well, I guess it like others: 9gag. Sometimes we like reading newspaper about technology like engadget, others from NYT, theguardian…; chatting, ...



Do you know our french support site and if yes, what do you think about it ? Some advice?

Well, I look through your site and it’s good! A very popular style and if you ask me for some advices, I guess that you should change to an other style to make you be unique. We suggest that you should add a tour to introduce about XenForo and trusted partners. You should also create a window for reviews from your customers & members.



You realize a great deal of style and this very quickly, but how do you make?

We have a very clear progress from planning, and then coding, testing and fixing and then launching the products.



For you, what features it lacks in xenforo?

Some function lacked from XenForo: Social Group, Member’s relationships, Content Management System … In the future, if XenForo 2.0 do not be developed, we will develop them.



What is the first thing you do when you connect to *******.com?

Well first thing I do is checking works yesterday and then reading email, tickets…. Others will do their jobs, depends on what they do.



What is the role of each in *******.com?

In our team, we have Manager, Designer, Coder, Front-end Developer, Tester/QC, Marketter and Copywriter. There are other positions for other things related to management, accounting, HR….



How do you manage your team and how works the tasks distribution between administrators?

We use JIRA to manage our projects.



What is the first thing you do when you wake up and the last before going to bed?

Surfing some technology websites, update news…., at the end of day, we summary our works.



The creation of the ******* company was difficult?

Work environment in ******* is open and it encourages creactivity of every members, so we try our best to have a lot of ideas in the product development process.



What is the ambition of *******.com?

In next year, we want to become number 1 in this market. (Now we are number 2)



Which hack is your favourite ?

We like Widget Framework, XenTag and our add-on Credit Premium.



What are your favourite books, movies, music, games, food?

One of yours and one of somebody else. It is a very personal question.



Where do you think you will be in 10 years ?

Oh, I don’t know. We try to do our best for now. In the future, I don’t be so sure, just try



Do you have a message for XenForo community french members?

“For the XenForo members in France, we would like to thank you for your support during those time and we hope that you will continue to support us in the future. We are planning to open our market to your country, so if there is anything to do, we need your help in the next time. Please continue keeping contact. We will let you know, soon!”


Last question, why ******* (Domain name)?

Our name says everything about what we stand for. We want the name "*******" with suffix "ium" to be synonymous in your mind with quality. More than synonymous—we want them to be one and the same. In fact, when you think "High Quality and Performance, "Responsive Design", "Fast and Lightweight" or "Unparallel Supported" we want you to think to "******* Product".

 

[HWS]

Sorry, but there are too many questions missing!
We do not even hear the name of the person answering your questions (why does he/she not introduce him/herself?)

"*******" is still a mystery and therefore not easy to deal with.
Which is bad, because this company has a lot of interesting add-ons and if you know nothing about it it's not easy to trust them and their business. They do not even show an address at their web site.

 

[oman]

Missing questions in relation to this - https://xenforo.com/community/threads/*******-add-on-cannot-be-uninstalled.82731/

What prompted you to place callbacks into your add ons that prevented customers from uninstalling them?

I was hoping for more compelling questions.

 

[HWS]

To be fair:
After all that trouble, ******* company changed their installation routine and does no longer backload PHP and MySQL code from their servers.

We in fact bought several add-ons and are satisfied with them. Sometimes some english language phrases are a little bit strange and have to be corrected, but this is a minor annoyance.

Sometimes also the code doesn't have the quality and usability expected, but the ******* company is listening to customers suggestions and quick in updating and later versions of their add-ons are really fun to use even at non-minor boards.

But again, knowing nearly nothing about ******* makes it hard to believe that this company earns enough money to pay all the salaries to it's coders, designers, managers (etc., see interview) and will be able to stay around and maintain their products for a longer period.

 

[Brivium]

Hello @oman,

Although in the past you could not uninstall our products, have you tried it now?

After XenForo released new rules and regulations, we complied absolutely. So maybe it is hard for you to tell us that, however we always try to bring our best to our customers.

Thank you for your feedbacks as well as because you are using our products!

 

[oman]

Hello @oman,

Although in the past you could not uninstall our products, have you tried it now?

After XenForo released new rules and regulations, we complied absolutely. So maybe it is hard for you to tell us that, however we always try to bring our best to our customers.

Thank you for your feedbacks as well as because you are using our products!

I never purchased one of your products. I just suggested a question that should have been asked.

 

[Brivium]

Dear @HWS,

We want to say thank you for using our products (add-ons) and we want to admit that all you said are totally right. We appreciate what you respond to us and we will try our best to bring to you and other customers the best quality service.

About our little secret, we think that it is very hard to be exposed. You know that today the security issues are becoming the matter of survival for any company globally. It is like you try to avoid the information leakage problem in this forum (Here's in XenForo Community). We understand the problem of customer, so we do not require verifying from them as well as you. So, we urge you to understand for what we could not say in public and to continue to support us.

We are not fake company. We are real and we serve our customer like to serve for Gods. But sometimes if there any things happened, it is common because we are human being and we could make mistakes like everybody does. After all, we know our value so we always listen to purchaser's feedbacks and try to improve it in our ways. The most clearly demonstrated is that we are standing at the second position on the Top Developers Rankings Table. And we all believe that you believe in us now, because if not, you are not using our products. And we are grateful for that.

Again, thank you @Allan for posting this content of the interview in this. We hope that you understand what we do and for the French XenForo, we hope that you will support us more in the future!

Thank you all!

 

[Alpha1]

Who is the CEO of *******?
How many developers does ******* have?
What other projects has ******* developers been doing outside of xenforo?

 

[cclaerhout]

It's not Allan fault since it has been a trend on Internet those last years, but the concept of e-mail interview is a nonsense. Either in the news media industry or in the research sector, if the replies given by e-mail are not analysed, checked and rewritten, it leads to give your readers not an article but an editorial advertising. An "interview" must have been prepared before to make it (and that's when a first contact by questions/answers can occur) which give a better opportunity to ask questions during the interview as a reaction to the last reply. Even a chat interview can be more spontaneous, but since technology allows it, why not perform interviews using online video tools? More work of course, but at least readers get what they deserve.

I don't know if it's a common habit for developers born in the commonwealth, but a lot use the pronoun "we" whereas it's obvious they are alone to code. Even if a craftsman has his company, I doubt he would use "we" speaking of his company. May be it's a detail, but it seems strange. I'm not saying it's necessary the case for *******, but I have doubts. When I read the first paragraph, the number of advertising language elements are quite impressive. I've been curious, I've clicked to see your website. And again, my doubts (let's call them like this) are meant to stay:

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I'm not sure John and Mijadam have ever used XenForo in their life. These testimonies are obviously fake, so no need to spend time to check for their real source with a reverse engine.

This message is not meant to target especially *******. A few XenForo developers do that too and on other scripts, such as Wordpress, this habit is almost a standard. But that's still dishonest.

 

[cdub]

It's not Allan fault since it has been a trend on Internet those last years, but the concept of e-mail interview is a nonsense. Either in the news media industry or in the research sector, if the replies given by e-mail are not analysed, checked and rewritten, it leads to give your readers not an article but an editorial advertising. An "interview" must have been prepared before to make it (and that's when a first contact by questions/answers can occur) which give a better opportunity to ask questions during the interview as a reaction to the last reply. Even a chat interview can be more spontaneous, but since technology allows it, why not perform interviews using online video tools? More work of course, but at least readers get what they deserve.

I don't know if it's a common habit for developers born in the commonwealth, but a lot use the pronoun "we" whereas it's obvious they are alone to code. Even if a craftsman has his company, I doubt he would use "we" speaking of his company. May be it's a detail, but it seems strange. I'm not saying it's necessary the case for *******, but I have doubts. When I read the first paragraph, the number of advertising language elements are quite impressive. I've been curious, I've clicked to see your website. And again, my doubts (let's call them like this) are meant to stay:

View attachment 89125
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I'm not sure John and Mijadam have ever used XenForo in their life. These testimonies are obviously fake, so no need to spend time to check for their real source with a reverse engine.

This message is not meant to target especially *******. A few XenForo developers do that too and on other scripts, such as Wordpress, this habit is almost a standard. But that's still dishonest.

Those are the most obviously fake testimonials I've ever seen. That's really unprofessional and is a big turnoff.

No one speaks like those people in their testimonials.

 

[whynot]

But again, knowing nearly nothing about ******* makes it hard to believe that this company earns enough money to pay all the salaries to it's coders, designers, managers (etc., see interview)

In our team, we have Manager, Designer, Coder, Front-end Developer, Tester/QC, Marketter and Copywriter. There are other positions for other things related to management, accounting, HR….

Yes, it's a huge company. Seems it has more staff than Xenforo.

For you, what features it lacks in xenforo?

Some function lacked from XenForo: Social Group, Member’s relationships, Content Management System … In the future, if XenForo 2.0 do not be developed, we will develop them.

With that number of staff it will be easily achieved.

 

[Alpha1]

I don't doubt that ******* has a good number of staff. I think the xenforo community sometimes mistakes software companies for single developers. with the amount and complexity of addons that ******* and various others push out there is no way that *******, Waindigo, xfrocks, etc are one man outfits.

 

[Moshe1010]

others push out there is no way that *******, Waindigo, xfrocks, etc are one man outfits.

Be surprised, they are. Waindigo had/has a partner, but except for him all of these are working alone. There is not enough money in XF add-ons for a huge team of developers working full time or even part time. If XF had 2 developers so far, and XF itself as a core is way more complex than any other add-on out there, then there is no reason that add-ons would have a huge hierarchy of developers. Except for the gallery add-ons and maybe the dead arcade, I haven't seen any "super-complex" add-ons in the resource manager (XR Reviews is basically on its way, but it's still in beta and even that was built by one person).

 

[HWS]

the dead arcade

Arcade is a very simple addon. Not even close to complicated. You just need to understand the API of the Flash games.

 

[Moshe1010]

Arcade is a very simple addon. Not even close to complicated. You just need to understand the API of the Flash games.

I think I've seen a custom made poker game somewhere here, not sure where it's not though (I was referring to this one)

 

[Alpha1]

Be surprised, they are.

I find this extremely hard to believe. Its not the impression I get from the various projects I had with Waindigo. Evidently they are often juggling many projects at the same time. When Jon is not around other people answer.