The Hackathon For Everyone
Hack Western came about as an accident.
It was a kind of daydream that Shirley, Ruth, and I dabbled with when we went to MHacks this September. We all thought we would be too busy this year, so we didn’t take it too seriously.
Attending my first hackathon changed all of that.
At this point I should introduce myself: I am a fourth year business student at Western who has always played around with programming, but never built anything serious. When I saw Ruth’s post on Facebook looking for a team to build an Android app, I was curious.
I’ve never built an Android app. Still, I mustered the courage to send a quick Facebook message to Ruth: “I’ll learn everything I need to know in the next 2 weeks to help build your team. I really just want to go to this hackathon.” The next day, she replies: “You’re in.” I’m introduced to Shirley and her friend, Leroi. I quickly find out that none of us know Android that well. We decide that we’ll learn and do a few tutorials and then wing it at the hackathon.
Fast forward to September. We enter a large university building and in front of us stretches a long, large hallway, packed with people in punny t-shirts, hoodies, onesies, you name it. On each side is a long stretch of tables, manned by representatives from top companies like Facebook, and startups like Moxtra. Walking by, you can hear hackers talking to company engineers about their ideas. They’re building websites, mobile apps, custom hardware. Most of them have no idea where to start. The engineers are showing them tutorials and websites to get them on their feet.
“Come by our booth any time if you need help with anything.”
This was different from a conference where we dress up, shake hands, exchange smiles, and discuss summer job opportunities.
So the weekend continued. I had amazing food, picked up tons of goodies from the companies and mentors there. At one point, I could go to one room to see Grace Choi break apart an HP printer to print makeup, and then go across the hall to see a talk on building my first wearables app, from scratch, no background experience required.
Do you remember when I told you that we would all study up on Android and be super prepared to work on our app? We didn’t. On Saturday afternoon, we started running into problems. We couldn’t get our basic application to run. A group’s member software wouldn’t load our project. We didn’t know how to save our data. It was a mess. We were getting discouraged. We started thinking of other ideas to work on. We were giving up.
That’s where mentors come in. We reached out through a Facebook group. In minutes, two hackers came by our space and started walking us through our problem. They stayed with us for several hours. By Saturday night, we were up and running. I think I got about five hours of sleep that entire weekend. Everyone was wired in, clattering at their keyboards.
On Sunday afternoon, we presented “I Hate Snow”, an Android app that lets you navigate from place to place on Western’s campus by using the tunnel system. Nobody used our tunnel system, and winters are pretty intense at Western.
It wasn’t the prettiest, most polished, or most advanced application. Still, you can click on two buildings and get turn-by-turn directions. It was our own little version of Google Maps. The best part is having your own space and being able to show off what you worked on that entire weekend. We were so proud that we made it to the end.
By the end of it all, we were obsessed with bringing this experience to our university. This is where Hack Western comes in.
What is Hack Western?
Hack Western is the first large-scale hackathon at Western University in London, Canada. We’re inviting 300 hackers to come together between March 27–29 and build incredible projects that solve real-world problems.
We’re also doing a few things that we think are pretty special:
- We want to get everyone hacking. It doesn’t matter what your major is, or how long you’ve been coding. We’re running workshops in March that will take you from zero to full-stack. We want to take you from scribbling ideas in your notebooks to creating the next big thing.
- We want to make our event as student-driven as possible. We want students to mentor each other, run workshops, and teach others. We’re working on a line-up of speakers and workshops that are run by sponsors and volunteers. Use this opportunity to show off what you’re passionate about! Get in touch by e-mailing hello@hackwestern.com if you want to speak.
- We want to bring students together to create a community of builders on campus. Western has a lot of different technical programs, and people who share a common interest are spread across multiple departments. We want Hack Western to create an inter-disciplinary student community that helps others bring their ideas into reality.
That’s a quick preview. Interested? Applications are open until February 27 on our website: http://hackwestern.com/. We’ve been working tirelessly since we got back from MHacks in September. We can’t wait to show you what we’ve got in store.
