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RIP software hackathons. Long live the hardware hackathon

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Re: RIP software hackathons. Long live the hardware hackathon

#131

Post by tracker1 »

junon wrote: post #73
axegon_ wrote: post #71

Makes perfect sense, all things considered. I've only joined a handful of hackathons. My best experience was in Amsterdam in like 2022, where half our team went to sleep and me and another guy spent the entire night locked up in a venue with 200 other people building stuff and bashing our heads against the table, looking for optimizations, hacks, half-assed solutions to near-impossible problems. In recent years, I've…

Unfortunately that will be short lived too. There's a lot of people toying with LLMs to develop hardware without understanding it too :|

A lot of my personal time, and a few others that I know, is being spent either updating, replicating or simulating the classic BBS experience today... while not really simulating the Modem itself.. trying to get the way a certain terminal looked in the old days is a bit of arcane knowledge combined with the time to make it work.

AI does a pretty good job of a lot of it... I've mostly been using Rust for my target language, the biggest parts so far in terms of rework/retries has been getting the "experience" how I want it, which isn't really a 1:1 of the classic experience, but updated. Like mouse scrolling for scrollback controls, etc.

There's also been a lot of activities in enhancing the BBS software that remains today (Synchronet, Enigma, Mystic and a MajorBBS remake) along with continued classics and some door games.

Re: RIP software hackathons. Long live the hardware hackathon

#132

Post by tracker1 »

killerstorm wrote: post #118

Hmm, looks like by "hardware hackathons" he really means "making software for more resource-constrained platforms". Nothing wrong with that, but I don't think that's a right name for it. Also adding some soldering to it won't make much difference. When my daughter was 4 y.o. she went to robotics classes where they assembled a small LEGO robot and made software for it using environment like Scratch. That's a good acti…

If 3D printing were a bit faster, a BYO robot hackathon could have some really cool outputs for different weight/size classes etc.

Re: RIP software hackathons. Long live the hardware hackathon

#133

Post by Footprint0521 »

This makes me so happy, because I have totally made my new side project lately lol

I just recently turned an old guitar hero controller into a fully functioning midi controller and it took so a little time. It actually makes me laugh

I swear the bar with AI now is just the craziest things that you can think of

Re: RIP software hackathons. Long live the hardware hackathon

#135

Post by marssaxman »

Footprint0521 wrote: post #133

This makes me so happy, because I have totally made my new side project lately lol I just recently turned an old guitar hero controller into a fully functioning midi controller and it took so a little time. It actually makes me laugh I swear the bar with AI now is just the craziest things that you can think of

> turned an old guitar hero controller into a fully functioning midi controller

That sounds like fun. Do you have anything written up about the project?

Re: RIP software hackathons. Long live the hardware hackathon

#136

Post by ssl-3 »

necovek wrote: post #100
ssl-3 wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Because ai cannot do hardware It can. > it cannot solder wire Plenty of placement and soldering machines exist that are far faster than humans. They just aren't yet integrated with the bot. For the stuff that is unusual or particularly difficult, just add a human. Same as with code. > it cannot replace red led with blue one and find current limiting resistor for optimal brightness Sure it can. Just add a camera. >…

And one needs to think from the outcome perspective too: maybe it is too hard to cut the part of the enclosure, but can it 3D print a new one hollowed out exactly where needed?

Or, I mean: This is a [hypothetical] human hackathon that is tainted by bots, not a bot hackathon that is devoid of humans [although I'm sure we'll have those some day as well].

Instructions that deliberately lack specificity, like "Drill a hole for the switch and then mount it" work fine in meatspace whether those instructions are issued by a bot or a human teammate.

Re: RIP software hackathons. Long live the hardware hackathon

#137

Post by emp17344 »

Footprint0521 wrote: post #133

This makes me so happy, because I have totally made my new side project lately lol I just recently turned an old guitar hero controller into a fully functioning midi controller and it took so a little time. It actually makes me laugh I swear the bar with AI now is just the craziest things that you can think of

I mean, a quick Google search shows that the web is absolutely inundated with articles and how-to guides on turning guitar hero controllers into MIDI controllers. It seems like a pretty common project.

Re: RIP software hackathons. Long live the hardware hackathon

#138

Post by Silamoth »

I’m all for hardware hackathons. But I think there’s still a place for software hackathons: Just don’t use LLMs. Generating an entire application with LLMs kinda defeats the point of a hackathon to begin with. It’s supposed to be about showing you can make something in a short time frame. It’s supposed to be about exploring and learning new areas with no long-term commitment. It’s supposed to let you develop your skills and build your portfolio; the time constraint forces you to actually finish something.

I can’t imagine going to a hackathon just to not write any code and outsource it all to an LLM. I wonder if any hackathons ban LLMs?

Re: RIP software hackathons. Long live the hardware hackathon

#139

Post by Silamoth »

klustregrif wrote: post #84
axegon_ wrote: post #71

Makes perfect sense, all things considered. I've only joined a handful of hackathons. My best experience was in Amsterdam in like 2022, where half our team went to sleep and me and another guy spent the entire night locked up in a venue with 200 other people building stuff and bashing our heads against the table, looking for optimizations, hacks, half-assed solutions to near-impossible problems. In recent years, I've…

> What he presented was 20 markdown skills.md bs files. I mean seriously, being literate is enough to get you the gold medal? Yes? If your problem is that there a tree in road and one guy builds a autonomous robot to remove it and the other guy just goes and moves it, the “dumb” guy wins. We are at a point in history where a couple of markdown files solve problems better than hundreds of hours spent by experts in bui…

Hackathons are about making and finishing something. That’s the whole premise: Instead of spending months working on a personal project that goes nowhere, give yourself a time constraint so you’re forced to finish something. Now you have something concrete to put on your portfolio (even if it’s still a proof-of-concept) - plus you’ve probably learned a lot.

Setting up config files for a tool is not making something. That’s like if I spent hours setting up my IDE, build processes, a CI/CD pipeline, and even unit tests. That might be cool and enhance my productivity down the line. But I still haven’t made anything.

Re: RIP software hackathons. Long live the hardware hackathon

#140

Post by Footprint0521 »

emp17344 wrote: post #137
Footprint0521 wrote: post #133

This makes me so happy, because I have totally made my new side project lately lol I just recently turned an old guitar hero controller into a fully functioning midi controller and it took so a little time. It actually makes me laugh I swear the bar with AI now is just the craziest things that you can think of

I mean, a quick Google search shows that the web is absolutely inundated with articles and how-to guides on turning guitar hero controllers into MIDI controllers. It seems like a pretty common project.

Oh 100%! But this still ended up being super fun, and I did mine differently with micro python and a knock off raspberry pi pico (cheaper on Amazon plus usb c) not to mention custom modes (keytar, strum)

It’s definitely not rocket science, but I have enjoyed having more control of it directly, as a musician, to tune it to what actually makes it make sense and be legitimately playable

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