With all of our feature updates and product developments, you might wonder who’s behind the blue screen here at TicketLeap. We have not one, but six super intelligent team members who function as our tech crew. With burning questions collected from our marketing interns, we set up a Q&A sesh with TicketLeap’s technology team. Tech is comprised of Shannon Baffoni, Tim Crowe, John Gibfried, Jack Murphy, Brian Frantz, and CTO Keith Fitzgerald.

What TicketLeap features are you most proud of? What makes TicketLeap’s site unique to others?

What features am I most proud of?  Hard to say- I’m most proud of how our team releases high quality features so regularly.  I feel like we have created a solid product that is feature-rich and, most importantly, continuously improving.  Our customers can be assured that bigger and better functionality is always on its way. – BF

Have you gained new techie skills since working at TicketLeap? 

 Working on features and functionality of the TicketLeap product has definitely allowed me to gather a much deeper understanding of architecture from a ten thousand foot view. Additionally, knowing the structure of a large system like ours allows me to think about and plan how a new feature would best be integrated into it.  I previously came from an agency, and anyone that comes from that background can tell you that the focus tends to be on time to delivery of features, rather than quality of architecture and development of those features. In agency work, frequently, you barely get to know the system you are working with before it’s out the door and you are on to another project. The deadlines in product work are more flexible and the breakdown of features in a much more agile fashion allows me to concentrate more closely on the quality of my code, and in general churn out a better product.
Not to say it has all been process. There is always some new pattern or technique I am picking up from my team, articles, or just general osmosis that ends up either being a boon or a dead end, but always educational. Working at TicketLeap, I have found myself working on features that, quite simply, no one else has done anything like. This makes it a bit difficult should I need to find reference information on the best way to implement something related to a feature like that, but it is exciting to know that we are working at the edge of the Internet. – JG

How do you prioritize your projects?

The product team uses a fairly typical agile process, adapted for our particular way of working. When we break up features before a sprint, we tend to prioritize the overarching stories (features) together. This allows us to all have a clear understanding about what is being done and who is doing what. Each story has a myriad of tasks which dictate the individual pieces needed to complete the overall story. We, as a team, try to break these parts into vertical slices, so a few of them can be completed and pushed to the testing environment before the feature is complete. This allows bits to be tested as we go, rather than all at once towards the end of a sprint. Each sprint tends to have a driving feature or features that become the sprints focus so, generally, those features have a higher priority than the other, generally smaller, features. – JG

What is your tech background? How long have you been with TicketLeap and what did you do before?

I started working at TicketLeap in January 2010, the same day as Brian! I’ve done a variety of jobs ranging from signing people up for their health benefits to being the Office Manager at TicketLeap. My degree is actually in Music Business so I have small chunk of experience working at music festivals and venues. Other than a handful of web design classes in college and some classes around town, that’s about all of my tech background. – SB

What has been your greatest accomplishment (at TL and outside of TL)?

At TicketLeap: hire people smarter than me. Outside of TicketLeap: being a dad. – KF

 

What is the tech team’s favorite brain food?

Here at TicketLeap we subsist on wraps, the food of the future. Around lunchtime you can usually find us down the street at the Wrap Shack. When we feel like spicing it up a bit we’ll head over to the El Ray or El Fuego to grab a spicy wrap. If we’re sick of those or just feeling lazy we’ll go to Under Dogs, which isn’t really a wrap, but similar enough to put me at ease. – JM

What’s it like working with a team all the time, especially in that tiny room? Do you guys have any running jokes?

We have a really tight knit team. We’ve been together for a long time and work very well together. Our personalities mesh perfectly. As for running jokes, they change all the time. Currently, the most common joke happens when someone says something like “We’ll really get moving once we get our hands on the general look and feel.” Someone will break into a British accent and yell “Get your hands off me! Don’t you know who I am? I’m General Lookandfeel!”  – TC