Media Advisory: Up to 110 students expected at UB’s third annual hackathon this weekend

BUFFALO, N.Y. – Dozens of Western New York college students are expected to compete in a 24-hour hackathon this weekend at the University at Buffalo.

The third annual event pairs budding developers, designers and entrepreneurs together to create new computer software in a fast-paced and creative setting.

At the hackathon’s conclusion on Sunday, teams will present their ideas to a panel of judges. They will be ranked based upon usefulness, technical difficulty, creativity and polish.

Here’s some additional information:

What: Contrary to the term’s connotations, the original meaning of “hacking” is coding and building computer software programs. A hackathon is when entrepreneurs, designers and developers come together to collaborate and build cool things.

When: The event starts at 2 p.m. Saturday, April 5, and continues into Sunday. Note: The best visuals will occur around 2 p.m. Sunday, when students start to demonstrate their hacks.

Where: Barbara and Jack Davis Hall, UB North Campus (building no. 37 here: http://www.buffalo.edu/buildings/maps/NorthCampus.pdf).

You may not know: UB hackers are developing a reputation as some of the nation’s best. Recently, they’ve taken home top honors at competitions in Michigan, Ohio and Indiana.

On-site contacts: Nick DiRienzo, Pat Jameson and Isaac Reath, all computer science and engineering majors at UB.

The hackathon was organized by UB’s chapter of the Association for Computing Machinery, which bills itself as the world’s largest educational and scientific computing society. Sponsors include Gradfly and Bloomberg, as well as Synacor, InfoTech Niagara, Facebook, Softrek Corp., Advance 2000 and UB’s Department of Computer Science and Engineering.