Interview w/ Lee Munroe

Interviewee: Lee Munroe of leemunroe.com

1. How did you get into web development?

From an early age I was privileged to have the Internet and a copy of Photoshop ;) I also had an interest in WWE (or what was WWF at the time). One day when I missed the bus to school I made my first wrestling website (on Geocities of course)

2. Your work has been featured in publications such as Wired Magazine and Web Designer Magazine, to what do you attribute to your success?

I just keep trying out and learning new things. TBWP, a project I did with Paddy Donnelly at Uni, had an interesting concept behind it, 'redefining the dictionary', so it got a good bit of coverage.

3. You have a wide variety of skills including Ruby on Rails, PHP, Flash and many more. How do you manage to keep all those skills sharp?

Honestly, they're not sharp 100% of the time. Over the years I've tried out a lot of different apps/languages so when a project comes along and I need to use Flash for example, I can easily adapt. It does get to a point thought where you don't have time to learn everything, so concentrate on what your good at and find others to help with what you're not good at.

4. Ruby on Rails is all the buzz lately, do you foresee a future where Ruby on Rails overtakes PHP in popularity?

RoR is great for getting an app (or at least a prototype) up and running quickly and there's a great community for feedback, plugins etc. But, there are a lot of PHP developers out there a lot of popular PHP apps/frameworks like Wordpress, CodeIgniter etc. So no, I think PHP will remain the 'weapon of choice' for the foreseeable future.

5. Freelancing can be hard, especially when your just starting out. How about some advice for freelancing noobs?

Make sure your own site looks great, provides info on your services and an easy way to contact you. Don't underprice your work and get deposits up front. Check out The Unlimited Freelancer and Rockstar Freelancer, 2 eBooks that will tell you all you need to know.

6. To those just starting out in the web development world, what skills do you see worthy of pursueing?

You must be able to build sites with web standards i.e. valid (X)HTML and CSS. Check out 'HTML and CSS Web Standards Solutions: A Web Standardistas' Approach'.

7. What can make or break good web design?

Attention to detail. Makes all the difference if you pay attention to every pixel. And stay away from Flash unless you really need it (e.g. some sort of interactive application).

8. What do you like to do in your freetime?

Work out, play the Xbox 360, hang out with the GF.