Hi! Let's talk about Hackathons First, let's learn what hackathons are about and what they are. Wikipedia's definition: A hackathon (also known as a hack day, hackfest, datathon or codefest; a portmanteau of hacking marathon) is a design sprint-like event, in which ... ...often computer programmers and others involved in software development, including graphic designers, interface designers, product managers, project managers, domain experts, and others collaborate intensively on software projects. The goal of a hackathon is to create functioning software or hardware by the end of the event. Hackathons tend to have a specific focus, which can include the programming language used, the operating system, an application, an API, or the subject and the demographic group of the programmers. In other cases, there is no restriction on the type of software being created. In other words, by joining a hackathon, you contribute to building and engineering a minimum functioning and viable product to pitch to the judges and win. Emphasizing on the "win" part of the hackathon, some hackathons have cash prizes swag recognition Some hackathons are used as a gateway to getting the participants hired by sponsored companies hosting the event. These are great reasons to join a hackathon. And there are great benefits to join them as well. Participants who join these hackathons tend to be put into teams. This means that you have to start networking and getting to know your team members. Especially assessing skills and planning on what to do and who to do what in the event. Maybe use Dropbox or GoogleDrive to share files? Or prefer planning on pen and paper? This tests them to learn how to be a teamplayer, learn to take on teammates criticism and provide support where anyone needs it. Working together is critical in this kind of setup. There are also hackathons that allow participants to go solo. Only for the confident and experienced in building a Minimum Viable Product from start to finish. For first-timers, best to join a team. Learn the rules, get mentored and ask plenty of help from both teammates and the facilitators. But then you may be wondering... How do I join a hackathon if I don't know how to code? Let me tell you. I knew how to code, but I didn't win my first hackathon. You can join a hackathon, and build things without coding. It’s also known as… No-Code or Low Code. But will get to that. But first to share my hackathon story. I joined a Brunei hackathon event and was put into a team. It was my first time and didn't know how it works. I put what I learnt about building webapps and managing databases up to deployment of the webapp. We didn't win. The problem was the scope of the solution was too broad. Putting way too many features into one app in a very short time causes so much stress. Lesson learnt #1 : Don't focus too much on the technicals. Focus on how to solve a problem first. Focus on building the solution as specific as possible as small as possible. I then joined another hackathon event in a different team and didn't win either. Technical approach wasn't the issue this time. It was the business side of it. The pitch for the app solution wasn't sound enough to get the judges (or the customers) to buy the product. I wouldn't buy what I just made either. I didn't understand how the app I made would solve a problem that just fundamentally is a content or user experience specific. I was more worried about just user onboarding that I didn't think of why would anyone want to use it. Lesson learnt # 2 : Build something that people or yourself want (or better yet, need) to buy. In the first two hackathons, I kept learning on how to code faster, build faster. But to learn to code more and build properly, takes longer to practice. And not alot of us has a lot of time for that. Lesson learnt #3 : During hackathons, focus on building a simple working prototype with lowcode/nocode approach. Then make it for real afterwards. There’s plenty of tools out there to build with lowcode/nocode. Some good examples are Thunkable, Adalo, Glideapps to build mobile apps. To build the backend, we can use StrapiJS, Budibase, AppWrite, NoCoDB. This proves that non-programmers can join and win hackathons too! And if you don't win your first hackathon as a team, learn from it. The mistakes that happened will be so valuable, you can then apply them in the next hackathon event or in your school group work assignment or at work. So to recap, a hackathon is an event that allows participants to join in, work together as a team or go solo, to solve a problem and build a solution towards that problem. Are you to ready to join some hackathons?