Last week we started a new post series in our blog where we ask a bunch of questions to some of our colleagues, partners and friends among Magento community.
Our goal with these questions is getting to know those professionals better, since they have a great experience and they stand out in different ways in the community.
This week Ivan Chepurnyi is here in our offices giving a master class in Magento developing, the perfect occasion to ask him about himself, his work and his opinion about the platform, don’t you think?
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Ivan Chepurnyi (in the picture with Ignacio Riesco, CEO of interactiv4) is one of the “fathers” of Magento, he belongs to the first developer’s team and, among the people who masters the platform, he is one of the best. That and his passion about his job, have led him to dedicate a big part of his time into training, sharing, that way, his knowledge and experience with all developers around the world.
Besides, he is the CTO of eComDev, the company that he founded with another partner when they were still working in Magento Inc. in 2010. The services they provide are Magento development, training programs and technical support, as well as some Magento extensions, to get the best out of the platform.
Here you have his answers, hope you enjoy them!
1. Tell us about where do you work and what is your position.
I am currently a co-owner and CTO of EcomDev B.V. Doing mostly technical consultancy and trainings for other Magento companies.
2. Linux, Windows or Mac? Why?
I am using Mac, since it has awesome usability and nice UI. As well you can do the same things as on any unix like system.
3. Which IDE do you use?
PHPStorm in combination with Magicento plugin.
4. Do you use any control version system? Why?
I cannot imagine any development without using DVCS. It is a terrible headache, if you code changes are not tracked, especially when you are working in team. I prefer using GIT, but sometimes customer is having SVN, so I have both VCS installed.
5. How long have you been working with Magento?
I joined Magento team in 2007, and was in the team of first five core team members. So currently have 6+ years of experience with the platform.
6. When developing, where do you look for help or support? 
Hard to answer, because most of the time I am providing help and support to other people. For me great support are manuals for PHP, Varnish, Sphinx, etc.
7. Within the developing community, tell us whom do you know and what would you highlight of them. 
I am quite familiar with German Magento community, since I like to attend their hackathons. I can highlight such community members, because they have very nice technicians and it is pleasure to work with them: Netresearch, netz98 new media, integer_net, Smile Benelux and of course Interactiv4. There might be a lot of other community members as well, but not all of them I know quite well.
8. What thing do you like most of Magento?
First of all it is system flexability. You can do whatever you want, with a small effort. For now there is no ecommerce platforms, that can compete with its possibilities. Hovewer my view can be not reliable, since I was involved in its development.
9. And the thing you like less?
Performance, flexability. Yes, flexability gives to much power to developers, so they don’t care too much about the architecture of their solutions. That’s why we see so much low quality extensions on the market.
10. If you could change 3 things of Magento, which ones would be?
I would change architecture of the domain model. After years, I see a lot of problems in its implementation, that were made on initial stage of the development. I think it is enough for 3 things, since it covers the whole system.
11. What do you think about Magento 2.0?
It is going to be awesome, I really like the changes, that were done on the low level of the system. They made things simpler and clear, I am confident, that if they follow the same path, they will make another great leap for the community of PHP developers around the world.
12. EcomDev stands out because of the development of market leader extensions, what could you tell us about the future of the company? Which are your future steps/goals?
We are not focusing on extensions as the company revenue maker. We mostly doing complex projects and providing of technical consultancy related to dealing with large databases, high load. Our key goal is to make Magento running at the speed of light for our customers.
Our next steps will be releasing more extension that optimize system performance, so community can benefit from our expertise in that area.
13. And the tricky question… What do you think about Interactiv4?
You are a great company. Your projects are outstanding and good showcases for the rest of the community.