If you missed my post last week, Rombla is a powerful WYSIWYG editor for Flash content. Built entirely in Flex, the application serves as both a powerful design tool and CMS. Rombla was built by Piria, a software company based in Louisville, Colorado.

I recently caught up with Piria CEO Bob Lang. Bob was kind enough to agree to an interview about Rombla, and gave me some great insights into how they built such an excellent application in such a short time.

InsideRIA: Rombla’s obviously a great website development tool. What were some of the other high level goals you started with when you built the application?

Bob Lang, CEO of Piria, creators of Rombla: The Rombla team is obsessed with improving usability. We explored many use models before designing our current user interface. We never stop debating ease of use tradeoffs as we add new functionality and we really appreciate receiving suggestions on how we can improve Rombla’s usability.

An important early design goal was to achieve “true” wysiwyg editing. We tested several development options and discovered we could use the Flex 3 framework to build interpreter to load and manage native MXML/CSS into the Flash player and render the source code on screen precisely as it will display after being compiled into a swf. This is the key to Rombla’s wysiwyg capability.

We also made an early commitment to maximize integration with other online design tools and content sources. Our first Alpha included full api search integration with Adobe Kuler and Photobucket communities. We are actively expanding Rombla’s connections which currently include Kuler palettes, Flickr, Photobucket, YouTube, Google maps, PayPal shopping cart. There are lots more to come. Please send us your suggestions.

InsideRIA: How long did it take you to develop Rombla?

Bob Lang: We have been at it for about a year now. The inception spec was written in late ‘07. We spent three months doing elaboration and prototyping. We then did a sprint for Alpha to show at Web 2.0 Expo in April. After some significant refactoring we began a series of Beta sprints leading up to the launch at Max. We are on track for commercial release in Q1 ’09.



InsideRIA: How big was the team on this application, and what was its makeup (designers, developers, project management, etc.)?

Bob Lang: We are a small company with 6 fulltime people working on 2 active projects; Two full time Flex application coders working on Rombla, two fulltime PHP coders dedicated to another project who also support the Rombla backend framework. 1 business manager and 1 project/test manager. Of course, we all wear several hats. We have also engaged several talented freelancers for UI/UX and graphic design over the past year.

InsideRIA: What is your development process at Piria like? Do you guys do some kind of agile process, do you take more of a waterfall approach, or something different?

Bob Lang: We use an agile methodology closely approximating the SCRUM process originally introduced by Sutherland and Schwaber. This is a very flexible approach that allows us to respond to emerging requirements. We maintain a functional backlog and then engage in development sprints that last from 1-3 weeks.
 The ability to edit content in-place like this really seems to remove the need for any sort of content management system.

InsideRIA: How do you see Rombla fitting into the web designer/developer’s toolset, and what other types of tools will it replace?

Bob Lang: With Rombla we are trying to push the limits of what you can build without traditional development tools or programming experience. We also make it very easy to access content from across the web directly inside Rombla. Storing and editing content in context is a very convenient approach and it can be used for a wide range of web projects. There are however limits to this approach. Extremely complex sites with large quantities of content will always require a professional developer and tools.

Experienced designers/developers may want to consider adding Rombla to their tool bag. The rapid visual development and ability for their customers to edit content could be a compelling option for small business projects.

Our plans include adding the ability to export the native MXML and CSS source for Rombla sites so they can be loaded into Flex Builder. We would like to hear from anyone interested in using Rombla as a prototyping tool for Flex development.

InsideRIA: Can you share anything about the business model behind Rombla? The application looks like it’s currently free - are there plans to move to a paid basis, or pay for an upgraded version?

Bob Lang: Rombla is free during beta. We will introduce a paid model in Q1. We are working on a pricing model that will appeal to businesses and designers alike. Currently, we plan to offer a free 30 day trial period followed by two subscription options in the $5 to $10 per month range. One will allow you to create and publish sites to Rombla sub-domains and another slightly more expensive plan which will allow publishing to existing or new external domains.

We will also offer multi-site reseller discounts for designers. Designers will be able to publish Rombla sites to domains that they already resell and manage for their clients. We are focusing development on a single robust version of Rombla editor. We plan to differentiate subscription levels based on backend service options rather than editing or design features.

Rombla was also designed from the start to be white labeled by other companies. We are currently working with a hosting/domain provider to offer Rombla as a provisioned service so their customers can quickly create sites and access ecommerce features.

InsideRIA: How is the company funded? Are you planning on raising venture money?

Bob Lang: Piria is currently funded by its founders with additional seed funding from an industry partner. We’ve been generating income from technology licensing during the past year, which we plowed back into the development of Rombla. We recently opened an angel funding round which we expect will close in Q1. These funds will be used to expand marketing and support operations for Rombla’s commercial release.

InsideRIA: Any plans for an AIR app? Can you tell us when we can expect to see one?

Bob Lang: Yes, we have planned to do an AIR version since the project inception last year. We attended early AIR training sessions at Adobe and architected Rombla to be “AIR ready”. We plan to add an AIR version to the development schedule after the commercial release in Q1. Now that Rombla is public and getting input from users I expect this could move it up on the list.

InsideRIA: Anything else you’d like to tell us about Rombla or Piria?

Bob Lang: We started on a mission to empower small business with an online tool to create professional websites. We quickly realized that we should not underestimate the importance of design “talent” in creating compelling websites. This led us to expand our goals to include improving the way designers and businesses work together.

Piria is committed to developing Rombla into a strong web design community. Site sharing is just the tip of the iceberg which will emerge as a robust marketplace with extensive networking and ecommerce features over the months to come. We expect Rombla to quickly grow into destination for businesses and designers to meet and collaborate on web projects. Designers will be able to showcase and sell their designs and services. Business will be able to buy web designs and engage designers to help optimize their site’s style and effectiveness.

Rombla was recently updated on 12/10 with a number of new features and bug fixes. Look here for a full list of the updates.

Read more from RJ Owen.