HackTrin
Interrupting our half-conscious state of Java-induced boredom, my AP Computer Science teacher one day announced that Trinity School seniors were hosting a Hackathon, and they would be delighted if a few Horace Mann students would compete. Coming off a dismal performance in the algorithm-heavy Philly Classic, the future computer science majors among us seemed uninterested. The more confused of us separated into two teams: I with Stan and Cavan, and another of two.

Though an app for Google Glass seemed novel enough to win without much effort, we eventually agreed on butlr, an idea I had originally wanted to keep for myself. The vision was simple: a commandline for the web. In a way, we wanted to move back in time away from the GUI, to create a more efficient terminal for web tasks.

At the Hackathon we used vanilla PHP to create a backend that essentially consisted of seven API calls. The frontend was perhaps more difficult, but we ended up with a, relatively, sleek website.

The judges were impressed, especially at our use of seven APIs (they actually counted). The other HM group created a beautiful study-tool aggregator, called StudySherpa, though their lack of WiFi connection during their demo somewhat diluted its effect. In the end, butlr won and StudySherpa got second (after a private redo with the judges).

NY Tech Day

Last year I took a trip to NY Tech Day, a tech convention for startups to recruit and show off their products, at Pier 92. It was interesting to be pitched to by hopeful college grads, and even more interesting to receive numerous job offers. I’ve since understood the transcendence of free labor, but at the time it was mind-boggling. One memorable demo-er was pitching her USB-connected breathalyzer that prevented git commits by the drunk. Even more amusing than the concept, she offered me a shot of scotch to test it out, after asking my age.

Anyway, we, the butlr crew, used the $400 HackTrin prize money to secure a booth at Tech Day 2014. Leading up to the event, we worked on Gevva (we changed the name because we wanted a .com and SEO) in our free time and not-so-free time. With our, slightly more confusingly named, product we headed to Tech Day. Our poster was 8.5x11, our tablecloth was thin and worn, our table lacked enticing knick-knacks, and our clothes lacked Gevva Branding. We were surrounded by startups with fashionable and incredibly attractive booths, with equally fashionable and attractive demo-ers. The only things that looked good on our table were our 40" monitor, proudly displaying the Gevva homepage, and maybe us (we’re pretty attractive too).

We sent a friend to grab bags of candy for the table, and started demo-ing. 8 hours of pitching, email-taking, smiling, and laughing later, we were exhausted. We had received 120 email addresses, 5 resumés, and some number of quickly misplaced business cards. For us, it was a successful day, and well worth skipping school (I may or may not have had a test I wasn’t prepared for that day).

TO BE CONTINUED…