Joomla in Faces. Uziel Almeida Oliveira (developer)

Hi, I'm Uziel Almeida Oliveira, better known online as uzielweb. I'm a web developer based in Parobé, Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil, where I work at Ponto Mega and Intercode and offer my services online for other agencies too. I've been passionate about Joomla since the Mambo days and specialize in developing lightweight templates, plugins, and custom solutions for the platform.

My first contact with the platform was around 2006, when it was still known as Mambo. I was looking for a free, flexible CMS for a few small client websites. I started with Mambo, and naturally migrated to Joomla 1.0 when the project forked. What immediately hooked me was the ease of extending the system with modules and components without ever having to modify the core code.

I tested several other systems in the early days until now, but since 2008, I have worked almost exclusively with Joomla, which represents 90% of my focus today. While some projects may occasionally require alternative options, Joomla remains my preferred choice in the vast majority of cases.

Yes, I'm highly involved! I release open-source plugins and templates on my GitHub (uzielweb), and I actively assist daily on the Joomla Stack Exchange, various Facebook groups, and the Crowdin translation platform. I also publish several translations on my GitHub and provide direct personal assistance through messaging apps.

While I do not currently have extensions listed in the Joomla Extensions Directory, I am actively working on submitting them.

I do this because I genuinely enjoy solving real-world problems I encounter in my projects. When I develop something, such as the Add XML Fields plugin, it's usually because I needed it for a client and realized, "Other people will need this, too". My motivation comes from seeing others use my work, receiving their thanks, and sometimes even having them contribute to improving the code. As an added benefit, this visibility has also led to several excellent job opportunities.

The Brazilian community is very active, welcoming, and collaborative. We maintain several strong communication channels, including key Facebook groups like Joomla Brasil, Joomla Brasil Oficial, and Traduções Joomla, in addition to an active Telegram channel for quick support and discussions. We also place a major focus on localizing the platform, maintaining a constantly updated pt-BR translation, to which I have contributed significantly.

The next Event is Joomla Day Brasil 2025 – Goiânia, under the theme Joomla! Fusion – Onde Web e IA se Encontram ("Where Web and AI Meet"), scheduled for December 6th and 7th. This historic edition will explore how AI is transforming the Joomla ecosystem, showcasing practical applications and intelligent integrations, which demonstrate our commitment to embracing new technological trend.

We need:

Yes, around 135 repositories! Most of them are pure Joomla: minimalist templates (Zero, Minimalista, etc.), performance plugins, utilities, custom field injection tools, pt-BR translation forks, and many dev tools to speed up daily work.

I use GitHub as my personal lab – if something works well on a client project and is reusable, I turn it into a public repo immediately.

I have custom Bootstrap ratios CSS for Bootstrap and a code for workaround from old Bootstrap to new (old span for new cols), for example, in my gists.

For me the biggest strengths are:

Twenty years is an absolutely incredible achievement for any open-source project. Though Joomla has been prematurely declared "dead" countless times—a notion I always find amusing—it is, in fact, more vibrant and technically superior than ever before. The current version of Joomla is truly a masterpiece of modernization. This milestone is a powerful testament to the resilience, passion, and dedication of its global community.

Looking ahead to the next 20 years, my wishes for the project are clear: to attract a new generation of developers, to see the release of a robust, official page builder, to deepen AI integration, to focus on strong marketing efforts, and, most importantly, to continue evolving fearlessly.

Happy 20th birthday, Joomla! May it thrive for many years to come.