Last weekend’s Hack Fargo Hackathon was a big success in many ways. With 27 participants, it was one of Fargo’s largest to date, organizer Blaine Booher said, and the winning project is now becoming a valuable resource for Great Rides Bike Share.

The focus of this hackathon was to use census or bike share data to create a unique, visual representation – think maps, websites, video, infographics, etc. The event was sponsored by AT&T, and lasted from Saturday, Nov. 7 at 1 PM to Sunday, Nov. 8 at 3 PM. Hackers formed teams and were able to work through the night if needed.

The winning team, Team Minimum Viable Product from Intelligent InSites, used data from Great Rides Bike Share to create a website that can integrate live data feed. The team was made up of Brandon Bakke (Mobile Development/Strategy), Sheryl Altobell (Developer), Steven Douglas (Developer), and Vidisha Bhatt (Quality Assurance).

“We wanted to motivate eco-friendly biking and encourage tourists to bike, so we created a scaleable, interactive product,” said Sheryl Altobell, software developer at Intelligent InSites and member of Team MVP.

Their website uses MapBox and Javascript to offer a library of data on stations and rides. Part of the site is an interactive map, which allows users to hover over a station and see whether or not it’s solar powered. It also uses a weather API to forecast the bike-ability of the day.

 

“We’ll definitely be able to use this for Great Rides Bike Share,” said Aaron Feickart, a volunteer for Great Rides and a judge at the hackathon.

Aaron explained that as a non-profit, Great Rides has little to no funds for website development and data analytics. The winning hackathon project is a win-win, in this case, he said.

Altobell, from Team MVP, said that the team met after the event to discuss next steps, and decided to move forward with the project.

“We have decided to finish the application and make it production ready,” she said, the next day. “We are talking with Great Rides Bike Share about using a live data feed vs. the static data set. We also feel that once we are production ready, we won’t be far off a mobile app to compliment the website.”

Perhaps this will be ready for launch by next March, when the bikes are ready to go once again!

The second place winner, Team What the Hack, was another Intelligent InSites’ team with a very similar project. They created a website for Great Rides Bike Share that allows bike users to view availability of bikes and other stats. It also features a Google maps integration that shows which bike station is closest to you, and allows you to plot a route using bike trails that are color coordinated with traffic levels.

Blaine Booher, Hack Fargo Hackathon organizer, and his cohort Matt took third place, with project “Sparklines.” Their project took Great Rides Bike Share’s 140,000 data points (taken from rides this past year) to determine trends such as: what days were the bikes more popular, what routes are more popular, etc. Move-in day at NDSU, for example, had huge numbers.

Winners received a combination of Fargo Theatre movie tickets, 20 Below Coffee free drink chips, and Fargo Brewing Company tokens. First place winners each received a Raspberry Pi, a tiny computer one can use to learn programming.

Other perks from the event included catering by Sweeto Burrito, Rhombus Guys pizza, and a variety of snacks (including a legitimate box of Tater Tots).

The event would not have been possible without the sponsorship from AT&T. Chris Tiedeman, AT&T spokesperson at the event, said that AT&T hopes to continue to be a supporter of Fargo-Moorhead’s burgeoning tech scene.

As for when the next hackathon will be, the date is still in the works, Booher said. However, one can be sure it won’t be long.

For the next event, Booher hopes to continue to see company teams like Intelligent InSites compete in the hackathon. Intelligent InSites was a huge supporter of the teams, helping them to make shirts, and even offering an incentive within the company to compete. More initiative like that, Booher said, will keep making these hackathons a stellar experience for everyone.

Jake Kohl wrote about his experience on Team What the Hack for Intelligent InSites blog.

“[The hackathon] demonstrated that when you put a small group together of smart and talented individuals from various backgrounds, you have the potential to tackle any problem,” he wrote.

 

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