What's a hackathon?

When I first heard the word "hackathon", it brought to mind a totally different connotation. I thought it was a competition among participants to "hack" or break into something. That definition couldn't be further from the truth, and if this was your initial thought then we were both in the same boat.

In reality, a "hackathon" is a competition among teams/individuals in which you have a certain time frame, in this case a weekend, to build an application that addresses or solves a real world problem. So when the first learned that a couple students in my cohort were signed up to do Fall In Vets 2021 Hackathon, I thought it would be a great opportunity to really apply what I had been learning in the past couple months.

Pick your role

At first, my mentality was just to have fun, but as soon as the competitive atmosphere sets in, it becomes so much more than that. Our team was lucky enough to have a UI/UX designer who has had prior experience competing in hackathons, so if you're thinking of competing in one, get someone who has experience with design. This helped us out substantially. We then assessed our team members strengths and preferences (i.e. frontend / backend) and were divided accordingly.

Communication is key

I cannot stress how essential having good communication was to our team. Even though we were divided based on our app's features, we were in constant communication with everyone on the team as to what was being done and who was doing what. This way everyone has eyes on every aspect of the project. Even though this was done virtually, being in the same Zoom room didn't take away from the in-person experience.

What's sleep?

After our first couple hours into it, I think everyone really gets into the zone and after listing out the core features to deliver the minimum viable product, it becomes apparent that every minute counts. I'm pretty sure I slept a total of 8 hours the whole weekend which was probably close to what everyone else got as well.

Our app

Our app was called "Vaxx Overflow" and it was aimed at solving vaccine waste in regards to the COVID-19 pandemic. Because the vaccine is time sensitive, hospitals end up throwing them away when they are unable to fill spots due to "no calls, no shows". After registering and filling out some medical information and preferences for the type of vaccine, users are then put into a queue. Medical care providers registered with app can simply update their current supply of the type of vaccine which would then notify users with similar preferences that an appointment is available via text.

Results

Our team ending up winning 1st place. I guess the lack of sleep was worth it. I think I can speak for everyone when I say that the experience alone was worth more than the result. Going into it, we had just started learning React.js in our bootcamp and we didn't even touch Django Rest Framework yet, but having to learn new technologies quickly is the epitome of being a developer. While I'm pretty sure the weekend took a year off my life with the lack of sleep and stress, I would definitely do it again. If you're on the fence about doing one, I would say just go for it. Even if you don't win, you will learn so much in such a short span.

Until next time, thanks for reading!