Q: What is Huffduffer?
A: Huffduffer is a tool for creating podcasts from found sounds. Whenever you come across an interesting audio file on a website, you can huffduff it: add it to your podcast.
On Huffduffer you can browse and search through audio files that other people have huffduffed and add them to your podcast.
But the real benefit of Huffduffer happens when you're not in front of the computer; once you've synced up your Huffduffer podcast with your iPod or phone (using iTunes or some other podcatching software), you get to listen to the best of the web's audio while you're walking to work or taking a long train or plane journey.
Q: When did you have the idea for Huffduffer?
A: I wanted a tool like Huffduffer for quite a while. Basically, I wanted to be able to gather together disparate audio from different sources, mostly spoken word like conference talks or radio interviews.
The "a-ha!" moment came when I noticed a podcast that my friend Jon Hicks had created. It consisted of the occasional song from an up-and-coming band that caught his fancy. Instead of hosting the audio himself, Jon simply pointed the RSS file at the audio links on the bands' websites. That's when it clicked with me that RSS enclosures were just another form of hyperlinks.
Once I had that breakthrough, I realised that what I really needed was a tool to make the creation RSS files easier. So I started building that tool for myself, but then I figured that other people might like to use it too.
Q: How long did it take to build Huffduffer?
A: It took about six months to build the site, but I wasn't working on it full time. If I had a team, I'm sure it would have gone faster but at the same time, I wouldn't have had the luxury of contemplation. Because I didn't have a specific deadline, I could ponder things for as long as I wanted. Of course, that could have been a weakness; there's always a danger that a project like that never gets launched.
Q: How long has the site been live? How is it doing?
A: Huffduffer went live in October 2008 so it's been going for over two and a half years now. I don't have any particular success metric for the site, other than increasing the level of happiness and knowledge in the world.
Like I said, I built the site for myself so the fact that anyone else uses it is a bonus. As it turns out, almost 6,000 people have signed up to the site. Because of that, there are enormous network benefits; Huffduffer has turned into a great resource for discovering interesting audio.
Q: What are your plans for the web site? Do you plan on bringing on any team members?
A: I'd like to keep adding useful features to the site; I definitely want to provide a widget for people to be able to put on their own websites. I don't have any plans to bring anyone else on board but I'm very interested to see what kind of things other people might do with the API.
Q: What did you use to make your web site?
A: Huffduffer is built on the LAMP stack: Linux, Apache, MySQL and PHP. PHP is the server-side programming language I'm most comfortable with (though I wouldn't describe myself primarily as a programmer). I thought about using this project as an opportunity to learn a new technology framework like Ruby on Rails or Django. In the end, I decided to stick with PHP and MySQL but I borrowed ideas from various frameworks. For example, I really embraced the MVC model of development that is common to so many good frameworks.
Q: Tell us a little about yourself
A: I'm a designer/developer hybrid. I started as a freelancer in the late nineties. Back then, there wasn't as much stratification with job roles which is probably why I'm a bit of a jack of all trades. These days, I mostly do front end development at Clearleft. One of the reasons why I like doing personal projects like Huffduffer is that I get to flex some skills that might otherwise be neglected.
Q: Is there anything about your experiece developing this application you're like to share
A: I find personal projects immensely rewarding and Huffduffer is no exception. Making a project for yourself allows you to experiment with techniques that might be too risky for client work. Conversely, the skills and lessons learned from working on a personal project definitely feed back in to the day job. I think I became a better designer and developer because of Huffduffer.
Q: Can our readers contact you with more questions?
A: If anyone wants to know more about how Huffduffer works, there's an about page: huffduffer.com/about
I'm using Get Satisfaction to manage feedback on Huffduffer: getsatisfaction.com/huffduffer
You can also send me feedback on Twitter. I'm @adactio.
Interview Date: February 2011