Event recap: our first community hackathon

Forty members, nine teams, one weekend. Our first community hackathon started as a half-joke in UNA Builders and ended with a Sunday demo session that ran an hour over because nobody wanted to stop.

Projects ranged from a meetup planner that suggests venues based on where members live to a bot that welcomes new members in three languages. One team built a small module that turns event RSVPs into a shared carpool list, which I suspect we'll be using ourselves before long.

What worked

• Short, concrete briefs. Teams that picked one problem in the first hour shipped something. Teams that debated for half a day mostly didn't.
• Mentors on rotation. Jackson Reyes and a handful of experienced builders took two-hour shifts, so help was always online.
• Five-minute demos, hard stop. It kept the energy up and gave every team a turn.

What we'll change

We underestimated time zones. Several members joined from the Americas and had to present in the middle of their night. Next time we'll run the demos in two sessions.

Thanks to everyone who mentored, judged and kept the coffee coming. The winning projects are posted in UNA Builders with their code, and we're already planning the next one. If you have an idea for a theme, reply here.