A Review of Hack the North 2023 but also just general Hackathon tips

Published: 2023-09-25

I was a hacker at Hack the North this year. As my second hackathon, it was a great time, and I’d definitely come back for next year. Each hackathon I attend makes me feel exponentially more prepared and knowledgeable about hackathons, and I thought I would spread what conclusions I’ve come to draw from this event specifically.

So here are some of the things I learned at Hack the North (abbreviated to HTN from now on), to make the most of your time at HTN or any other hackathon.

1. Find people with the same goals as you

Deciding if you’d like to treat the event like a competition or a convention is the first thing you should do. Although I will say, wanting to “take it easy” can quickly turn into “skip all the events and stay in the same room all weekend trying to finish our project” very easily due to influences from the environment.

It’s easy to want to work hard when everyone around you is (one of the reasons why people are able to be so motivated/productive at these things.), and if you get a sudden burst of motivation and decide to make something, that’s great! Just don’t treat your supposed to be chill project as something you’re pushing to win a prize with. Just being surrounded by other people making things can help you make something too, even if you aren’t trying to win anything.

Don’t feel bad for not wanting to skip sleep and debug deep into the early AM. If you don’t want to build anything ambitious (or anything at all) and just connect with sponsors/other hackers, that’s a just as valid way to treat the event. Just make sure how you’d like to go about it aligns with your other group members. Make your goals clear.

2. Consider your tools ahead of time

If you are planning on making something (or trying to WIN something), Categories for submission are usually made available before the event starts, as well as the list of sponsors that will be there. There are usually 3-5 categories, as well as 5+ sponsor related prizes for using their stuff. If it’s an MLH affiliated event, they’ll usually have a few prizes of their own for you to go after.

It’s important to pick a 1-2 prizes/categories and target them well. Look to previous winners for inspiration but don’t let it tunnel vision your idea into doing something that’s already been done, novelty is very important for a stand-out project at these events.

Decide a tech stack with your group. Try to pick things they’re all familiar with, as you don’t want to waste time learning about the thing at the event when you could be making it. Don’t forget to include sponsor’s API or database or whatever you’re planning on using once you decide.

I generally tend to favor the “best” tools over the most popular tools 🤓, that obviously being subjective. I do personally prefer minimalist tools that has the features I need over using a part of the feature-set of a larger tool. These do tend to be less popular then the bigger industry standard ones (Contrarian and minimalist!?, it’s the linux user in me).

It’s a balance between picking tools that you all are comfortable with, but also working with people you enjoy working with.

As for specific project brainstorming and what you’ll make with those tools, I’d say leave that for the event. It’s part of the fun after all.

3. About sleep.

Bring an air mattress/sleeping bag/camping cot/whatever you need to be able to get any amount of restful sleep.

I guess people have finally began to understand that coding while sleep deprived leads to diminishing returns very quickly, and sleep is extremely important in almost every aspect of health and productivity. I am especially sensitive to sleep too, I get 8 hours every night and just can’t sleep on the floor. I know for some people a sleeping bag is more than enough, but I don’t got that dawg in me.

If you don’t either, then you need to be responsible for making sure your sleep is good. Some hackathons advertise they’ll provide sleeping arrangements, but I’d recommend to be responsible for your own sleep accommodations, as the provided things aren’t always the best. Use a nice mask to block out light, use earplugs or earbuds with some brown noise, put something on the ground to sleep on, and try to get as much rest as you can, You’re working hard and definitely need it.

Okay but how was Hack the North 2023?

Hack the North was good! The sheer scale of the event is unmatched.

There were so many of us.

The Waterloo Engineering 7 building is cool, with lots of windows, although it’s a gigantic 7 storey building, that’s open from the top to bottom throughout, I did get a little vertigo looking down from the top floors.

I’d describe the size as a 2x2x2 Bergeron centre. Approximately 8 Bergeron centers.

There was a job fair, although it was PACKED and all the sponsors were placed in a tiny corner of a floor, even one of the recruiters I spoke to agreed they needed more space.

I love job fairs though, taking stuff off of tables fulfills my non-existent kleptomaniac tendencies.

I “equiped” all the stuff I got at the same time and felt like a goofy looking RPG character with optimal stats.

The food was alright? When it came to variety and the challenge of having food prepared for 1000 people they did a good job.

I’d speak on the workshops but I got too distracted by my project and didn’t attend any!!! One of my big regrets, I’ll definitely force myself to go next time around.

It also sucked that all the GameDev ones were at like.. 2am. I really would’ve loved to go to the Unity workshop and bask in the vibes of the then recent changes announced that went over great with every member of the Unity community.

There was also one on APIs with GO that I would’ve liked to GO to. 🤠

The room me and my team found was nice, there were only 3 other groups with us, and they weren’t too loud which was appreciated.

HTN told us that there would be sleeping arrangements, however I don’t think they anticipated everyone to want to sleep so didn’t get enough air mattresses???

3/5 of the sleeping areas had no air mattresses left.

And by “areas” I mean “space on the corner of each floor next to an elevator and staircase that people will use all night”. 💀

Considering HTN is a student run event with over 1000 participants, I can definitely empathize with things not going as expected or falling through the cracks. I don’t blame anyone.

I think sleeping arrangements are the most important part of your hackathon though, more than food and workshops. It’s important to get right because it’s very hard for individuals to cover themselves in the moment (especially internationals), where you could say, order food yourself, if they had run out for instance. Please assume everyone is going to sleep!

From this moment on I will always be responsible for my own sleep at these events though.

What did we actually make

PiktoCache!

It’s geocaching but with messages and ip addresses. You can visit a specific IP address and leave a message there!

We didn’t really pick a specific category or sponsor and also had intended on “taking it easy” but still worked pretty hard on making it functional. Checking ip addresses is a bit more complicated then you’d think, and works a little inconsistently in this version.

But it’s a fun idea that worked out! I’ll likely revisit at some point.

okay that’s it see you all next post

If you see me at hack the valley tell me “The omens were good.” and I’ll know you read this and that would be very cool :)

~~Bold of me to assume I’ll get in.~~