Ben brought graphic design skills, Cat did data analysis and transformation (in python) and I did iOS development.
On Friday night we looked at the amazing array of data available and came up with the idea of making an app that lets you check a place to live to see how... "liveable" it is.
The effort involved grabbing data from a variety of sources, normalising that data into scores that indicated the "goodness" of a location. Some data sets used postcodes and others used suburb names so there was some work required to map these.
While it was freezing cold in Canberra, the atmosphere in the room was warm and focussed.
I think having a small team worked well for us and the fact that our skills were all different and yet complementary meant there wasn't much overlap. Our entry suited the iterative development style that a hackathon invites in that we had something working pretty early on Saturday and were then able to add more data until we figured it was time to write up what we'd done and make the video you need to enter:
Making the video does take time and our approach was to make a recording of the mobile device screen first and then record a description which was added as the audio track later. Some teams did things as simple as making a slide show and exporting it as a movie while others made full on documentaries about their entry.
GovHack is a wonderful event, it encourages diverse teams to come together to work with fantastic data from enlightened government departments. The sponsors that get behind it are to be applauded and the organisers do a great job. This year I'm a volunteer and will be hanging out at the Sydney event.
If you're reading this before 28th July, get over to govhack.org to find out more and register. I look forward to seeing you there!
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