Hyland Software is among the latest companies to host a weekend hackathon for a greater good.
CLEVELAND, Ohio - While lots of children in Northeast Ohio are still putting in last-minute requests for electronic Christmas gifts, about 100 high school and college students were expected at Hyland Software today to design technology products themselves. And they'll be at the hackathon for the next three days.
It's an inaugural event for the Westlake-based software company, but Hyland has sponsored hackathons at Ohio colleges and other companies for the last few years. And some of their employees go to other cities to participate in hackathons throughout the country.
Nationwide, a growing number of companies like Yahoo, Paypal, American Greetings and the Cleveland Clinic are hosting hackathons to bring together people in different fields to design, build and demo new products in a short period of time.
Some of the most innovative companies embrace the concept of hosting these events (generally 24 to 48 hours) with hopes of developing future products for their organizations, but companies such as Cleveland-based LeanDog is going into its fifth year of bringing creatives together for GiveCamp to help area nonprofits.
Dennis Sasinka, senior manager of development at Hyland, said some of their employees like to participate in hackathons because they want to show off what they know, learn from others, and do something in a different realm than their normal projects. In some cases they might do something fun like creating a game or an app, or they might develop a website that incorporates data to help a nonprofit with a cause.
"These people are passionate and they want to do things in different realms," Sasinka said.
Some of those same employees will help students this weekend at Hyland. The theme for Hyland's hackathon is giving back to the local community. It's a broad theme that could mean developing an app that people could use to report trash or potholes to a city, or find other ways technology might help a community or a nonprofit.
They'll be bringing blankets and pillows. Some will stay the entire weekend and some will come and go as they please. When they're not sharing ideas and working on coding, they'll be enjoying other parts of the large headquarters that includes a gym and auditorium. The hackathon includes basketball and hacky sack tournaments and watching movies.
"It's a great way for us to attract younger talent," said Caitlin Nowlin, technical outreach program manager. "That's why we're inviting high school and college students."
American Greetings
While some companies like AT&T and American Airlines have partnered to sponsor hackathons that attract third party developers to create travel apps, American Greetings started their own internal hackathon to encourage their own engineers and designers to try new tools.
About 120 employees participated in an internal Hackathon at American Greetings this year. In 2007 only 30 employees participated in the annual event. That first year in 2007, only about 30 employees participated in a conference room, but now each year about 120 people participate. They break out in about 40 to 45 teams and work on projects for 24-hours, then make presentations at the largest venue at the company's Brooklyn headquarters.
"We were inspired by Yahoo's Hack Day events to start our own," said Mike Pirnat, advisory engineer at American Greetings. "Our business folks now partner with tech talent too to bring prototypes of their ideas to life in a short time. It's a really great showcase for the talent, enthusiasm, and creativity of our staff, regardless of discipline."
Pirnat said it's a great way for colleagues in various divisions to come together and learn about what they do. And in the last nine years several of the projects have turned into products or helped update tech tools the company uses.
"When we're looking at doing something new, it's great to have a library of projects we can refer to for insights and inspiration," Pirnat said. "It's pretty common to say, "Oh, I think somebody did a Hack Day project like that; let's see what they did with it."
LeanDog
At LeanDog, a software development company located on Cleveland's waterfront near the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, the company has been sponsoring Cleveland GiveCamp for the last five years. A group of about 200 or more tech, marketers, designers and project managers come together each July for a weekend to complete projects for nonprofits in Northeast Ohio.
Some participants at GiveCamp pitch tents for the annual July hackathon at LeanDog software firm on the waterfront near downtown Cleveland. The teams take over the floating office, once home to Hornblowers restaurant, and many pitch tents on the lawn off Marginal Road. They created 19 projects at the most recent hackathon, including new websites, a GPS-enabled web app, an educational game and database applications.
Thanks to the event, one of the nonprofits got improved data collection and reporting capabilities, allowing a staff member more time to work on other agency projects. Children have a new online game to help them understand the importance of healthy eating and how worms help food grow. It's now easier for an organization to track equipment inventory it loans to its program participants. And individuals seeking affordable housing in Akron now have an online searchable database that features up-to-date listings in real time.
At least 200 people come together at LeanDog to participate in Cleveland GiveCamp, a hackathon aimed at helping nonprofits Nick Barendt, director of studio and a partner at LeanDog, said hackathons are happening every month, but they came up with GiveCamp because they thought it would be a fun way to make a difference for the community. It's a way to give techies an organized opportunity to help groups outside of schools and churches they're affiliated with.
"It's a powerful emotional experience on Sunday afternoon when each team with representatives from nonprofits talks about what they built and the impact the project will have," Barendt said. "It's very intense, in a good way, because of the time constraints...It's not unusual that they get teary eyed."