Hackathons

But that wasn’t the only nerdy thing we did that weekend. We also participated in a health hackathon sponsored by Apps4Philly and Code for Philly. That’s right, the Health Department supports hacking. Especially when that hacking is about taking health information that’s already available and making it more useful. In anticipation, we worked with the folks at OIT to publish five sets of data that we hoped folks would use.

Our own Briana Morgan doing an excellent reflexive piece.

Zach Rendin does a photo reel of the hackathon highlights for DemHack 2015!

TP article on the hackathon projects.

Nice write up with highlights from James Tyack.

WHYY did a preview article for the hackathon, nice write up.

The Apps for Philly Education Hackathon will bring together developers, designers, students, teachers and more to build applications designed for use in education from May 2 to May 4 at Impact Hub and the Science Leadership Academy. The hackathon is organized by Code for Philly, Jarv.us, Slate, and Philly EdTech meetup.

Ten teams and more then 40 participants took to the 3rd Ward makerspace in Kensington last weekend to compete in the third annual Apps for Philly Transit hackathon.

It was the first time the hackathon, led by Northern Liberties web firm Jarvus, took a wider transit look than just SEPTA. Find results from last year here and the 2011 Apps for SEPTA here.

If you have an idea for improving transportation in Philadelphia that can be turned into an app, there’s an upcoming event for you.

It’s a weekend-long hackathon that starts with an idea session on Friday evening and ends with a demo session from 4 pm - 5 pm Sunday Sept. 22.

The event is a follow-up to the Apps for SEPTA hackathons of the past two years and will be held at 3rd Ward Philadelphia in Northern Liberties.

The organizers are Code for Philly, Jarvus Innovations and Code for America. They hope to have information about data sources from a variety of transportation organizations that coders can tap into for their apps, either by themselves or in combination with each other and data from SEPTA.

Creating applications that can impact education was the focus of this weekend’s AT&T EduTech Hackathon, where twelve projects competed for semi-finalist recognition for two sets of cash prizes and services that are intended to help those projects live.

Nearly a dozen small teams launched projects dedicated to improving SEPTA service during the second annual Apps for SEPTA hackathon earlier this month.

The event, hosted by Devnuts in Northern Liberties and in partnership with the transit agency, introduced a variety of applications, including one featuring an interactive way to browse transit lines, a simulator for SEPTA staff to test changes in train and bus schedules and a Foursquare app that allows users to see upcoming trains as soon as they check-in to a station.

For civic coders, data is the raw material apps are made of.

SEPTA has loads of it.

For the second time in two years, the transit agency is asking local hackers to cook up something useful.

We never thought we’d be saying this, but maybe more state and city agencies should be like SEPTA.

SEPTA, a quasi-public state agency, participated in the SEPTA “hackathon” this weekend, where software developers tried to make helpful applications related to the transportation system. And when we say SEPTA participated, we mean participated: Mark Headd, a Voxeo Labs developer and organizer of the event, said the agency not only gave geeks ready-to-use data, but actually showed up at the event this weekend.

“I’ve never been to a hackathon where the agency or organization that’s the subject, if you will, was physically present and working with developers,” he said.

An application called “Simple SEPTA” was the top prize winner among a dozen projects at the SEPTA Hackathon, reports Technically Philly.

All told, more than 30 participants took place on at least eight teams, though other side projects and deviations were shared as is often the case. At least six officials from the SEPTA emerging technologies team were on hand throughout the two-day event. In addition to a half dozen small projects to make SEPTA more rider friendly, the transit agency announcedit had opened up a dozen new data sources, as documented on a SEPTA URL including the word ‘hackathon,’ an innovation itself.

“I have never seen a city agency be this supportive and this present at a hackathon,” said Mark Headd, the Voxeo Labs developer who organized the event with web development firm Jarvus, which operates Devnuts and Technically Philly recently profiled. “So it’s no surprise we saw so many strong, viable products come out of it.”

This weekend SEPTA will be sponsoring a hackathon in an attempt to make the best use of real-time data in the form of smartphone apps. Developers will spend the weekend engineering programs that may eventually become available through Apple’s App Store or other application databases.

SEPTA hopes to join the burgeoning movement this weekend. With Devnuts, a self-described “hackerspace” in Northern Liberties, the transit agency is cosponsoring a “hackathon” aimed at quickly producing apps that utilize SEPTA’s wealth of real-time operational data.

About 25 to 30 people are expected, and you don’t need to be a software geek to participate, says Mark Headd, a Wilmington resident who has worked both sides of the government-business divide. Headd once advised Delaware’s governor on information technology. Now he’s a developer for a Florida company, Voxeo, and has helped organize half a dozen hackathons here and elsewhere.