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Friends of TYPO3 01: Tomas Norre Mikkelsen

Welcome to  the first edition of  the “Friends of TYPO3” series. Let’s say “Hi” to the first interview partner: Tomas Norre Mikkelsen. He is a danish guy having a TYPO3 job in Germany and is engaged  in the TYPO3 community for many, many years now. This post is the interview with him.

First I want to thank Tomas, that he instantly replied to my request and, at the same time, had the courage to be the first one interviewed in this series. Thank you.

Tomas, what was your first TYPO3 version?tomasnorre_aoe_dane

If I remember correctly it was version 3.6 back in 2004, perhaps a little earlier, I had my first client project in 2004, based on this version at least.

How did you get in contact with TYPO3?

I got introduce through some study colleagues back in University when I was doing my Master in Computer Science at Aalborg University (Denmark)

How do you contribute to the community? In which areas are you active?

I’m part of the TYPO3.org team. I’m maintaining, together with a colleague, the EXT:crawler, EXT:languagevisibility, EXT:aoe_ipauth, EXT:scheduler_timeline.
 
Besides from that I’m participating in conferences. The last two years it went to T3EE in Cluj, where I gave a talk both years. Talks was on “Extension Development – The sky is the limit” (2015) and “Jenkins JobDSL – Configuration as code” (2016).

Is there a possibility to support your activities? If yes, how to do it?

The extension development can always be supported by adding issues, pull request etc. on github. Donations are of course always welcome, but we work in open source so I appreciate what comes and if not, I just hope people are happy with what I provide. The TYPO3.org project is something that one can join if one would like to.

Do you have any TYPO3 events on your agenda, where it will be possible to meet you in person

The next event in my schedule will be the typo3.org sprint next year, which is not dated yet. Furthermore I am for sure considering the DevDays in Malmö and the T3EE Conference in Cluj next year again.

What was your last TYPO3 event? What was special about this?

The T3EE in Cluj, it’s special because it’s really a social event, and really focusing on development. I’ve been there two years in a row now, and I plan to go back.

Do you remember a nice and / or funny TYPO3 episode (anecdote), which you would like to share?

At my first TYPO3 Conference in Frankfurt in 2010, at the main party I talked to Jürgen Egeling (@je_fft), he asked me about how I felt about the conference price. I told him that it had a cost of roughly 1000€ for me to attend the conference, and the network I have build, if that could just spare me 10 hours of work within the next year, then my ticket has payed itself.
 
He liked my way of thinking and used my explanation the next day at the closing ceremony, I remember that being quite cool, being quote at my very first conference.

One of your hashtags on Twitter is “#daneingermany“. How did it come? Why did you move to Germany?

The hashtag started because quite a lot of people thought I was German, and I wanted a “fun” way to show that I was actual Danish. I moved to Germany because of the job, AOE GmbH offer me a position as TYPO3 Developer and that was and opportunity that I couldn’t turn down. I also wanted to be closer to an active TYPO3 community, the community in Denmark wasn’t that big in my era, and after joining my first TYPO3.org code sprint in March 2013 I really got lured by the idea of moving close to the “epicenter”.

What other activities and hobbies do you have besides TYPO3?

Golf is a big passion of mine, probably as big as TYPO3, so my year is often golf in summer and TYPO3 Community work during off-season. I also run once in a while I think it was me and @jhernst that started the #t3runners tag on twitter.

Finally

Thank you, Tomas!

Thank you Tomas for taking the time to answer the questions. As it was the first issue, I was very happy that you stepped in that quickly. :-)

Thank you, readers!

Thanks to all who were reading until here. I hope you enjoyed the first issue of “Friends of TYPO3”. If you have got more questions, I should ask please drop me a note. Also if you know somebody who should be interviewed. You can contact me via Twitter (@MarcusSchwemer), e-mail (marcus@typo3worx.eu) or TYPO3 slack (@mschwemer). 

Last, but not least: Here is  Tomas “Steckbrief”

  • My Name: Tomas Norre Mikkelsen
  • Age: 36
  • Nationality: Danish
  • Current location: Wiesbaden, Germany
  • If you want to do Tomas a favor, head to his wishlist: 
  • If you want to get in contact, use these channels:

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