[Haskell-cafe] "Hackathon"

[Richard Eisenberg]

Hi Cafe,

In my experience, "hackathon" can refer to two very different sorts of events: hacking marathons (such as jacobsHack), where participants tend to work overnight to accomplish something amazing in a limited time; and hacker weekends (such as Hac Phi), where participants work on projects, socialize, and then (presumably) rest at night.

Both of these sorts of events have their place in the world, and I'm in no way suggesting one is "better" than the other. But, I do think it be good for all of us to name them differently, so folks know what they are signing up for. In particular, I'm worried that calling hacker weekends "hackathons" may discourage those of us with outside, inflexible commitments (e.g. kids; the need for 8 hours of sleep) from attending. Conversely, folks looking for the higher-energy environment of an all-night marathon might be disappointed to show up at a hacker weekend.

What do you think? Is this distinction pointless? Would being consistent about this difference help?

Here are some proposed new names for hacker weekends:
- Hacker weekend
- Hacker meetup
- Community Hack
- Weekend of Haskell

I personally favor reserving the term "hackathon" for the marathon events.

Richard
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[Brandon Allbery]

On Thu, Aug 28, 2014 at 10:06 AM, Richard Eisenberg <e...@cis.upenn.edu> wrote:

In my experience, "hackathon" can refer to two very different sorts of events: hacking marathons (such as jacobsHack), where participants tend to work overnight to accomplish something amazing in a limited time; and hacker weekends (such as Hac Phi), where participants work on projects, socialize, and then (presumably) rest at night.

I've noticed this as well; my boss likes to use it in your second meaning, whereas I'm most familiar with the first meaning and tend to think of the second as "hacker-con".

On the other hand, I have no answers to the questions (a) is there any recognition of this, or conventions for this, in the wider programming community; and (b) what makes more sense to other people.

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[Alois Cochard]

Hi Richard,

I'm not sure really, as a "hacker weekend" can easily transform into a "proper" hackathon depending of the folks there and the enthusiast around the projects.

The difference look very small to me, and I never seen the ambiguity as an issue.

In fact Zurihack felt pretty much like a coding marathon, I'm not sure if the "not sleeping" thing should be considered as part of the definition of a hackathon...

Anyway, just my very personal way of thinking about such thing. I understand your concern about people being discouraged, but maybe given a more detailed explaination of the event really ease would help.

--

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[Brandon Allbery]

On Thu, Aug 28, 2014 at 10:19 AM, Alois Cochard <alois....@gmail.com> wrote:

In fact Zurihack felt pretty much like a coding marathon, I'm not sure if the "not sleeping" thing should be considered as part of the definition of a hackathon...

IMO it's not; the difference is one of focus, more specifically is there one or a small number of specific projects or is there a larger slate of things that one can pick and choose from and which may well change their form based on participation *plus* unorganized gatherings (socialization/"hallway track"). My "hacker-con" take on the second form implicitly recognizes that the "hallway track" may well be as continuous as it is at many other conventions....

[Tikhon Jelvis]

I ran into this issue when telling people about Bay Hac. In college, at least, "hackathon" has acquired a pretty specific meaning: a *competitive* coding marathon, often with prizes. Bay Hac, on the other hand, was really more like a mini-conference: talks, sessions and lots of socializing, but no competitive aspect at all. (Personally, I like this quite a bit more than a normal hackathon!) I didn't want to send the wrong impression, but I also didn't know what else to call it except for "hackathon".

Even though BayHac had *some* aspects of a hackathon, I still don't think it's a great description. If focuses on the wrong aspects. In my view, the most important parts of BayHac were educational and social, and it was incredibly valuable even if you didn't finish or even work on a project. This is pretty much the opposite of most actual hackathons I see; even when they have some focus on education, they still tend to be heavily "getting-things-done" project oriented.

I'm really not sure what the best noun to use is, but I'm leaning towards describing it as a mini convention or conference.

[Gershom B]

On August 28, 2014 at 1:50:40 PM, Tikhon Jelvis (tik...@jelv.is) wrote:

> I'm really not sure what the best noun to use is, but I'm leaning towards
> describing it as a mini convention or conference.

I agree that hackathon has come to mean something else. But mini-convention or conference doesn’t really capture the semi-spontaneous character of it, and something like “community hack” or “meetup” or “hacker weekend” doesn’t capture that really lots of people do just show up and code all weekend long. “unconference and skillshare” maybe, but that’s sort of goofy…

perhaps “community hackathon” to capture both the ground-up unstructured character, and the fact that it centers around (no matter what else is going on) lots of people with computers, talking about and writing code in small groups?

-g

[Alois Cochard]

I didn't realize there is such a competitive aspect in a "real" hackathon (which, to be clear I never attended).

From what I experienced at ZuriHac, I had the feeling there was two side to the event. Certain persons where pretty much in the "getting-things-done", taking the opportunity to be together and achieve great things in a small amount of time.

Definitely not for the competitive aspect (at least I never felt it that way), but more for getting things done.

There was other folks like me who actually didn't wrote much code, but spend time discussing/socializing/helping/...

So I understand it's not sticly a hackathon, I think it would be nice to have the word "community" in it as it's really what is at the core of such event.

 

[Tikhon Jelvis]

The meaning has narrowed in certain circles. Just like "meme" has come to mean "picture with white text" to certain people, "hackathon" refers to a more specific sort of event among college students (that I'm familiar with). Many US universities have had small scale competitive hackathons in the past, and now, after the success of PenApps, have adopted *very* similar models for their events. So now that's what "hackathon" refers to: working on a brand new project in a set time with little/no sleep followed by some sort of presentations and judging. Pretty structured and self-contained. And very different from the Haskell events!

It's also a bit tricky because the *Hac events are pretty different from each other. BayHac and Hac φ felt similar in 2013, but both were very different from BayHac 2014 (which I enjoyed the most of the three). Perhaps it doesn't even make sense to use the same term for all of them, but then I'm really not sure what to do!

[Joachim Breitner]

Hi,

Am Donnerstag, den 28.08.2014, 10:06 -0400 schrieb Richard Eisenberg:
> What do you think? Is this distinction pointless? Would being
> consistent about this difference help?

TBH, my impression is that this thread is searching for a shed to
color...


These events are all different anyways and people will have to look at
description to find out what _exactly_ they entail. Just leave it to the
organizer to name it however they want to.

Greetings,
Joachim

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[Richard A. O'Keefe]

On 29/08/2014, at 6:30 AM, Gershom B wrote:

> On August 28, 2014 at 1:50:40 PM, Tikhon Jelvis (tik...@jelv.is) wrote:
>
>> I'm really not sure what the best noun to use is, but I'm leaning towards
>> describing it as a mini convention or conference.
>
> I agree that hackathon has come to mean something else. But mini-convention or conference doesn’t really capture the semi-spontaneous character of it, and something like “community hack” or “meetup” or “hacker weekend” doesn’t capture that really lots of people do just show up and code all weekend long. “unconference and skillshare” maybe, but that’s sort of goofy…

Is this a "code retreat"?

I've never been to one, and have wondered how they work out.

[Richard Eisenberg]

On Aug 28, 2014, at 5:34 PM, Joachim Breitner <ma...@joachim-breitner.de> wrote:
>
> TBH, my impression is that this thread is searching for a shed to
> color...

Though I started the thread, I agree somewhat with this conclusion. Of course all events are different and participants need to read the fine (or not-so-fine) print to learn more.

But, branding matters. I attended Hac NYC and Hac Boston over the past few months and enjoyed both a great deal. However, when I told non-Haskell friends that I attended "Haskell hackathons", I got several responses of the form "... and how many women were at these events?" It just got me thinking.

Anyway, it seems a fair conclusion to draw from these responses is that I should just do what I want -- there's no consensus to diverge from!

Thanks,

[Jon Sterling]

For what it's worth, I get super turned off at the first mention of
"hackathons" or even "hacking". Which is a shame, since the few
Haskell-related events I have been to which were billed as such were
really nothing of the sort, and were instead quite good! Just a few days
ago, I learned about Day convolution during a "hacking session", for
instance.

Kind regards,
Jon

[Jay Sulzberger]

On Thu, 28 Aug 2014, Richard Eisenberg <e...@cis.upenn.edu> wrote:

>
> On Aug 28, 2014, at 5:34 PM, Joachim Breitner <ma...@joachim-breitner.de> wrote:
>>
>> TBH, my impression is that this thread is searching for a shed to
>> color...
>
> Though I started the thread, I agree somewhat with this
> conclusion. Of course all events are different and participants
> need to read the fine (or not-so-fine) print to learn more.
>
> But, branding matters. I attended Hac NYC and Hac Boston over
> the past few months and enjoyed both a great deal. However,
> when I told non-Haskell friends that I attended "Haskell
> hackathons", I got several responses of the form "... and how
> many women were at these events?" It just got me thinking.
>
> Anyway, it seems a fair conclusion to draw from these responses
> is that I should just do what I want -- there's no consensus to
> diverge from!
>
> Thanks,
> Richard

Traditionally in New York City some people call the gathering
without hard agenda a "Hack Fest".

oo--JS.