Hi All,

Please join me in welcoming Ian Baker as Software Developer in the Features Engineering team.

Ian's been a software developer for about 15 years. He's worked on projects like the first open-source web framework, a billing system for a regional ISP, a custom video transcoding system, and a sensor-based flamethrower controller.

At Wikimedia Foundation, he hopes to code some awesome features, help find new ways for people to share and connect information, help improve the overall Mediawiki user experience, and advance the codebase towards present-day software development practices. Specific interests include data model design, database query optimization, regular expressions, user interfaces, human computer interaction and online communities.

Ian has been building large-scale installation art since 2005, and has taught flame effects, fire performance, and fire safety classes at The Crucible and elsewhere since 2006. Ian is a founding member of the art collective Ardent Heavy Industries, including its fire art wing, Interpretive Arson. In other lifetimes, he’s worked as a broadcast engineer, welder, machinist, fire performer, drug educator, EMT, and photographer. And he also enjoys flower arrangement and aerial acrobatics. Wow - that’s a lot of cool interests :-)

Feel free to say hello to Ian online or in person at WMF Engineering in San Francisco.

Welcome Ian!