1 leonidg's notes for running a hackathon
2 =======================================
4 This is basically just a braindump I made while running Pterohacktyl
11 Announce the hackathon at the SIPB meetings coming up to it.
13 Send out an email to sipb-announce@mit.edu, mentioning date, time,
14 place, name, etc. Sound excited and enthusiastic. Add a "tl;dr" for
17 Create a Facebook event. You probably want to be an administrator of
18 the SIPB Facebook group for this.
20 Add it to the SIPB Google Calendar. You need to get bits for this as
23 Advertise the event on your Zephyr class.
25 Send a reminder email the day before.
31 SIPB allocates $150 to a hackathon. Most of this should be used on
32 food (see below). If you have extra money, you can be creative. For
33 Hackasaurus Rex and Velocihacker, we purchased prizes off of ThinkGeek
34 and raffled them off on the hour. It was reasonably popular.
36 You should expect to spend, out of pocket, most of the $150. You will
37 be reimbursed by SIPB. Make sure to collect itemized receipts for all
38 purchases and put them in an envelope in the treasurer's drawer
45 Purchase snack food at La Verde's. Two 2-liter bottles of soda, two
46 large bags of chips and two jars of salsa have served us well in the
47 past. Greg Price also suggests hummus and baby carrots as good
50 You will also want to purchase dinner food. Ask around for
51 preferences. In the past, we have purchased large amounts of Indian
52 food, including 20 mango lassis. If you call and ask to talk to the
53 manager, you can likely get a small discount.
55 (N.B.: Dhesi Daba is not a good choice for cost efficiency reasons.)
57 It is generally a good idea to have a good idea what people actually
58 want. In particular, take note of spiciness and vegetarian
61 You should order food well enough in advance that the restaurant has
62 time to prepare and deliver it by the time you want it, but also not
63 so early that you don't have a good sense of how many people are at
64 the Hackathon and what they want to eat. Probably around 2-3 PM is
73 (Make sure you are on moira group sipb-www, as you will need to create
74 files in that locker).
76 For statistical purposes, it is useful to know how many people came to
77 the hackathon. A simple Python app is available at
79 /afs/sipb/project/sipb-www/web_scripts/hackathon-signin/
80 http://sipb.mit.edu/hackathon-signin
84 /afs/sipb/project/sipb-www/web_scripts/hackathon-signin/HACKATHON_NAME
86 contains the name of the current Hackathon. This script will record
87 the users' input in YAML-encoded text in the file
89 /afs/sipb/project/sipb-www/web_scripts/hackathon-signin/records.txt
91 You can use this file for raffles (for prizes), statistics, spam,
97 After this, you should create relevant pages:
99 http://sipb.mit.edu/hackathons/<HACKATHON_NAME>
100 Take a look at, e.g. http://sipb.mit.edu/hackathons/velocihacker/
101 for ideas. Also, have http://sipb.mit.edu/hackathon and
102 http://sipb.mit.edu/<HACKATHON_NAME> redirect to this page.
104 http://sipb.mit.edu/hackathons/<HACKATHON_NAME>/projects This
105 should be a list of projects that are being worked on, including
106 people and locations. Have an item for "your project here!" or
109 Also have http://sipb.mit.edu/<HACKATHON_NAME>/projects redirect
112 Note that the wiki has no "create page" button, and there is no "edit"
113 button on pages that don't exist. To create a new page, go directly
116 https://sipb.mit.edu:444/ikiwiki.cgi?do=edit&page=<PAGE>
118 To add a redirect on a page, the wiki code you want is
120 [[!meta redir=<DESTINATION>]]
125 Encourage discussion on zephyr, either on -c sipb or
132 A hackathon is every bit as much a social event as a technical one, if
133 not more so. It provides a unique opportunity for people to meet each
134 other and work together in informal environments, and for people to
135 get to know SIPB (and vice-versa).
137 As organizer, you should make every effort to talk to new people.
138 Make sure they feel welcome, answer their questions (and ask them
139 some!), and generally try to make sure they are engaged and
140 entertained. It is very easy, especially near the end, for SIPB
141 regulars to get into a niche and for new people to feel excluded. Try
142 to make sure that that doesn't happen.
148 In general, it seems that Hackathons end with mostly hardcore SIPB
149 members sticking around the office (which is, of course,
150 understandable). You should make sure that you clean up the office
151 (if you have to leave early, either clean up before going or delegate
152 someone else to do so). If you want, you can try to organize a small
153 event (e.g. movie night). Note that movie nights should not be
154 organized as official, public SIPB events (which the hackathon is) for
157 Send a follow-up email, discussing stats, thanking people for coming,
158 etc. Mention it at the following SIPB meeting.