Dragon Tribal, a member of monxoops.fr who has been registered on the site since 18/10/2024, sometimes posts on our forums to invite us to test the modules he develops.
This piqued our curiosity, and this article is an opportunity to learn a little more about this member through his answers to the questions we sent him.
Here is the interview.

Hello Dragon Tribal,
We have noticed for some time on monxoops.fr that you have been offering us modules to test and requesting feedback for improvement.
First of all, can you tell us a little more about yourself?

Of course, with pleasure. My name is Stéphane, I am 47 years old, and I have been working in IT for over 20 years.
I live in Évry, in the Essonne department (91), and I work in IT outsourcing, more specifically as a systems and network administrator.
My work covers both physical and virtual servers as well as the overall infrastructure of my clients' IT equipment (computers, software, network, antivirus, Fortinet firewall, etc.).
I can't really name my clients (it's sensitive), but they range from small local authorities to companies in very specific fields (e.g. atomic measurement).

How long have you been using XOOPS and how did you get started?

I started using XOOPS after a disagreement with a friend in video games, around 2007–2008.
At the time, he was using PHP-Nuke (from memory, it was a very popular CMS among gamers), but most teams had websites that all looked the same.
So we tested several CMSs until we discovered XOOPS.
At that time, there were many modules available, often updated, and themes that were very different from each other. Our multi-gaming association (France-Clan) was able to stand out, and that's when my adventure with XOOPS really began.

What did you like most about XOOPS?

What struck me most at the beginning was the help available: an active community on scripts and forums, as well as good documentation on how XOOPS works.
There were few resources in French, but enough to understand the basics and move forward.

How did you use it?

With a few members of the association, we developed a module dedicated to our site to manage competitions on various online games (e.g. BF3, COD, ETQW, Minecraft). (Editor's note: BattleField 3, Call Of Duty, Enemy Territory: Quake Wars).

And now you develop your own modules. Is this for professional purposes, for an association, or something else?

After a few years, I continued to develop modules on my own, but more for private use. For example:
- A friend of mine had a dance club, so I created a module where students could present their dance cards, and a scanner would read a QR code to automatically deduct the number of classes already paid for.
- My ex-wife, who was the director of a recreation centre, wanted a secure space to share photos from a trip to the mountains, so that only families could access them. So I developed a module where the activity leaders could create albums, and a security code was sent by email to the parents to view the photos.

Then I took a break from development to focus on my daughters and my work after my divorce.

Let's talk about your modules in development and production. Can you tell us about them, their benefits and their progress?

Last year, after a five-week hospital stay, I returned to XOOPS to keep myself busy and pass the time.
For almost two years now, I have been coding regularly again.
My biggest module is a chat feature that I worked on for nearly a year.
Looking back, this project is rich in features, but it is not yet suitable for the average user because it requires fairly advanced configuration and setup.
I then published three other modules, designed to be easier to use and, above all, without complex modifications to server files.
That's my story with XOOPS in a nutshell.

Editor's note:
Current Dragon Tribal modules:
Chat Module (Live communication)
xoopspulse Module (Audience measurement statistics)
TDPerfBench Module (Measuring actual server performance)

What do you expect from XOOPS in the future?

What I expect most from XOOPS is a larger French-speaking community.
It would also be interesting to have more different themes, and not always based on the same structure, even though I imagine that this may not always be easy to achieve.
Above all, more useful modules are needed in order to reach a wider audience and encourage more people to adopt XOOPS.

Thank you, Stéphane, for your answers and your active participation in new modules.
Please know that if you would like to join the monxoops.fr team, you are welcome to do so.