Where can we find you on the internet?

My personal site is aaron.jorb.in and I use aaronjorbin just about everywhere. Github (github.com/aaronjorbin) and twitter (@aaronjorbin) are the two best places to keep up with what I’m working on. I work on all things front end for Privia Health (www.priviahealth.com)

When and how did you get started with WordPress?

My first exposure to WordPress was in 2007 when a few friends and I built a satirical site based around the idea of future news. From there, I found small projects on craigslist ($25 to move from one host to another) that slowly built to people hiring me for custom plugins, themes and sites. After about two years of this, I started to follow core development and tried to become a part of it. A few rejected (and rightfully so) patches later, I finally was able to get some code added to core. now 3 years later I’m still contributing patches when I have the opportunity.

What resources to you turn to when you want to learn something new?

My friends and coworkers are my biggest bringers of knowledge. I rarely have to search out new knowledge, I just have to start chatting with them, see what they have recently starred on github or look at what they are tweeting.

What is your favorite WordPress feature/aspect?

I love the plugin api. Actions and Filters makes it incredibly easy to build so much.

What is your favorite development tool and why?

Unix. I can’t tell you how many times cut, time, grep, cat, |, or nc are all I need to figure something out.

What advice do you have for others looking to become WordPress experts?

Read the source and start contributing. Find bugs and fix them. The more intimate you are with WordPress core, the more you’ll be able to writ code that is forward compatible.

Bonus Question: What is one interesting non-WordPress-related fact about yourself?

I spend my free time volunteering as a Simulation Director for a collegiate Model United Nations conference.