(by Matt Le, Web Developer & Designer at Resound)
My first experience with WordCamp could best be summed up in these three words…pho, spring rolls and WordPress. I had an awesome time—it was like all of the best things I love about web design and development wrapped up in a ‘WordPress’ spring roll wrapper.
I love photography, so naturally I took lots of pictures. Here are most of them…
It all started on the open road.
We arrived at our lodging. 
A dog greeted us.
We ate some local food!
Woke up the next morning for Wordcamp LA.
After a great day of seminars, we were invited to downtown LA for a social mixer.
Mike and I hung out with the Archers, Cody and his wife. They are cool (Phoenix) people.
More Viet food that night…
Seven course beef spring rolls = MAGIC
Now we leave LA reflecting along the way.
But first some coffee.
..,and burritos.
Then we hit the road.
For some reason it has always rained when I drive back from California.
This trip was amazing and I’m exceedingly grateful for the opportunity to be a part of it. Here’s some take aways from Wordcamp LA 2014:
1. The WordPress community is open and friendly. I met so many awesome people to connect with. Lots of developers seem to be behind this ‘opaque firewall’ but there’s real people behind all the blogs and posts, so it was fun to meet and engage them in person. You’re around some brilliant people so ask a lot of questions.
2. Write down all the terms that you don’t know. People throw around lots of buzz words and, to stay concurrent with industry, you have to be able to understand and talk the lingo. If things are going at a snail’s pace, ask people. They’re super friendly.
3. Be a perpetual learner! Going to a conferences has its own way of giving you the opportunity to be stay humble. There were lots of points during the developer seminars where things were flying over my head. I was encouraged to stay sharpened and keep gaining knowledge and understanding.
4. Having the right technologies for workflow is the key to efficiency. I attended the seminar, Starter Theme Workflow with Roots.io by Shaimoom Newaz. It was awesome to connect with the idea that technologies like Grunt and Bower don’t have to be intimidating to designers. Designers and developers alike have a middle ground with these tools. I’m excited to take these tools back to my team.
