Questions ?

Yes. All hackers abide by the Hack Upstate Code of Conduct to maintain an open, friendly and inclusive community, in which Upstate New York’s tech community can adeptly connect, communicate and collaborate. Please read it here.

Yes. Please read it here.

You are welcome to come! Please complete our under 18 waiver here.

We recommend parking at the Harrison/Warren Street Parking Garage (Fully automated, $7 daily or $15 overnight), or the Hotel Syracuse Parking Garage ($5 per day, $10 overnight). Additional parking options can be found here.

Lodging will not be paid for, but if you need a hotel we recommend the Marriot Hotel, directly accross from the venue.

Nope! You can build whatever you would like with whatever tools you want. We will have some awesome prize categories though.

The hackathon is open to everyone!

Everyone except sponsors and judges (to keep it fair).

You’ll have a chance to share it the day of the event.

Everyone will have the opportunity to showcase their projects on Sunday during our closing ceremony / project presentations.

Talk with people about their ideas and find which interests you the most! We expect the teams to form organically.

Yes, but you will only be eligible for one prize.

We recommend you stay for a majority of the time and encourage you to participate as much as you can.

No team limit! However, if it's a themed prize, not everyone on the team will get a prize. We recommend a max of 5 people per team (front-end, back-end, designer/ UX, dev-ops, data).

No, you will not! This is a huge misconception, it's actually quite the opposite. If you're ever stuck on something, go find a mentor, volunteer, or organizer who can help. Or, seriously anyone at the event. We'd be willing to bet they will help you!

That's totally fine. You'll meet people at the event, everyone is super friendly. Lot's of poeple go to our event wihtout teams, so it's normal to ask around if you're looking for a team or if you can help out.

Even if your project is not finished or you don't want to present, we encourage you to anyway. Hackathons aren't about being the best or being competitive. It's about having fun, making friends, learning new things, and celebrating technology. Presenting gives you a chance to be proud of what you've created!

At a minimum, you will need:

• laptop / computer
• charger / power cords
• eagerness to build something awesome

We also recommend:

• extra change of clothes
• toiletries
• sleeping bag / blanket (it gets cold at night)
• hacker setup
• energy drink of choice
• a decent amount of sleep
• headphones
• backpack for swag
• favorite snacks
• notebook / paper / pencil / pen / markers
• jacket / hoodie / beanie (it gets cold at night)

What else should I bring?

Of course! Raspberry pis, arduino boards, oculus rifts, etc. are all welcome.

Yes! We have tons of awesome hardware in our lab for you to borrow. We also have:

• 10 HDMI cables
• 2 keyboards
• 2 mouses
• 2 low-end lenovo thinkpads

We will have two laptops provided for you to borrow (but, they are pretty old)

Yes, if you would like to just stop by to hang out and learn about the hackathon you are more than welcome to. We encourage you to participate.

If you don’t mind uncomfortable sleeping spots, sure. Bring a sleeping bag and pillow if you'd like. If you can stay up for all 24 hours though, you are indeed a trooper.

We are not offering reimbursement for travel at the moment, sorry.

Not a problem! It’s entirely irrelevant what your experience is going into a hackathon, it’s more about your interest in technology. There will be a way for you to make an impact, we're certain of it. We make our hackathons very welcoming and beginner-friendly through mentors at the event and our amazing community that is happy to help new folks. If you want to dive into code or sharpen your skills, check out Treehouse, Codecademy, or FreeCodeCamp. For more information on how non-developers can contribute to a hackathon, please explore these two links.

• 5 hackathon roles that have nothing to do with coding
• Hackathons aren't just for developers

The teams themselves 'own' the projects and intellectual property. We wouldn't have it any other way.

Projects will be on Devpost, and we'll post winners to our website. If teams have loose ends to tie up they might meet to finish the project - it really depends on their availability. We encourage teams to keep on hacking even after the event is over!

You can try find a team using devpost or pitching your idea in Slack, but you can decide at any point during the event what you'd like to work on.

We are not. We're a student / practitioner hackathon, run by non-students. We love MLH though!

Please contact team@hackupstate.com if you have any questions or concerns.

This was last updated 3/15/2018.