gitlab·Apr 22, 2026·3 min readCurated summary

GitLab AI Hackathon 2026: Meet the winners

Nearly 7,000 developers participated in GitLab’s 2026 AI Hackathon, creating more than 600 agents and workflows for the GitLab Duo Agent Platform. The winning projects focused on practical software delivery challenges—including organizational knowledge loss, security, compliance, migrations, and sustainability—rather than simple chatbot interactions. The results suggest that agentic AI is becoming most valuable when integrated directly into development workflows and given richer project context. ## Hackathon Scope and Evaluation - The hackathon ran from February 9 to March 25, 2026, on Devpost. - Google Cloud and Anthropic co-sponsored the event, contributing judges, prizes, and cloud resources. - Nineteen judges evaluated projects on: - Technical execution - Design - Potential impact - Quality of the idea - Total prizes reached $65,000. ## Grand Prize: LORE - LORE, or Living Organizational Record Engine, addresses the loss of institutional knowledge when engineers leave. - It combines: - Eight specialized agents - A router that directs questions to the appropriate agent - Protections against circular loops in its knowledge graph - A visual dashboard - Carbon tracking - Its command-line tool includes 43 tests, leading judges to describe it as a polished product rather than a typical hackathon prototype. ## Google Cloud and Anthropic Winners - **Gitdefender**, the Google Cloud Grand Prize winner, detects security issues during code review, writes fixes, and opens the review automatically. - **Aegis**, the Google Cloud Runner Up, explains the reasoning behind its AI decisions and is deployed on Google Cloud. - **GraphDev**, the Anthropic Grand Prize winner, maps code relationships and shows how systems evolve, helping developers understand the impact of changes. - **DocSync**, the Anthropic Runner Up, uses Detector, Writer, and Reviewer agents to update documentation. It opens a review when confident and creates an issue for human review when uncertain. ## Category Winners - **Time-Traveler**, winner for technical achievement, creates a safe copy of a production environment and runs database migrations against it using five connected agents, PostgreSQL, real data, and Google Cloud deployment. - **RedAgent**, the most impactful project, verifies AI-generated security findings before developers act on them, addressing distrust in automated reports. - **Launch Control**, recognized for ease of use, combined polished user experience, strong infrastructure, and sustainability considerations. ## Sustainability-Focused Projects - Five projects received sustainability prizes or bonuses as the organizers highlighted the growing energy cost of CI/CD systems and large language models. - **GreenPipe** analyzes CI/CD pipelines and generates carbon-footprint reports. - Sustainable Design bonuses recognized projects including: - **BugFlow**, which generated 10 fixes from one bug report in 20 minutes - **DELTA Cyber Reasoning**, an automated fuzz-testing tool - **CarbonLint**, which applies code analysis to energy consumption - **TFGuardian**, which includes carbon-footprint analysis - One project reduced monthly costs from $556 to $18, representing a reported 96% carbon reduction. ## Honorable Mentions - **SecurityMonkey** tests security scanners by injecting known vulnerabilities. - **stregent** enables CI/CD investigation and fixes through WhatsApp. - **Compliance Sentinel** evaluates merge requests for compliance risk and blocks critical violations. - **Carbon Tracker** measures the carbon footprint of individual pipeline jobs and suggests improvements. - **RepoWarden** captures the rationale behind code, not only its behavior. - **MR Compliance Auditor** maps merge-request evidence to SOC 2 controls and displays compliance scores in real time. ## What Comes Next The projects operated within a single GitLab project, but many teams supplemented their agents with local knowledge graphs to understand code relationships and dependencies. GitLab plans to build on this approach in future hackathons by providing agents with richer context. GitLab’s hackathon demonstrates that the strongest AI agents are workflow-integrated tools that can investigate, make decisions, execute changes, and involve humans when needed. Developers can explore the 600-plus projects in the gallery or build their own agents on the GitLab Duo Agent Platform.

Read original(opens in new tab)

HackathonDatabase DesignMachine LearningCI/CD+4

line·Dec 30, 2025Original article

A Business Trip to Japan After Only One (opens in new tab)

Joining the Developer Relations (DevRel) team at LINE Plus, a new employee was immediately thrust into a high-stakes business trip to Japan just one week after onboarding to support major global tech events. This immersive experience allowed the recruit to rapidly grasp the company’s engineering culture by facilitating cross-border collaboration and managing large-scale technical conferences. Ultimately, the journey highlights how a proactive onboarding strategy and a culture of creative freedom enable DevRel professionals to bridge the gap between complex engineering feats and community engagement. ### Global Collaboration at Tech Week * The trip centered on participating in **Tech-Verse**, a global conference featuring simultaneous interpretation in Korean, English, and Japanese, where the focus was on maintaining operational detail across diverse technical sessions. * Operational support was provided for **Hack Day**, an in-house hackathon that brought together engineers from various countries to collaborate on rapid prototyping and technical problem-solving. * The experience facilitated direct coordination with DevRel teams from Japan, Thailand, Taiwan, and Vietnam, establishing a unified approach to technical branding and regional community support. * Post-event responsibilities included translating live experiences into digital assets, such as "Shorts" video content and technical blog recaps, to maintain engagement after the physical event concluded. ### Modernizing Internal Technical Sharing * The **Tech Talk** series, a long-standing tradition with over 78 sessions, was used as a platform to experiment with "B-grade" humorous marketing—including quirky posters and cup holders—to drive offline participation in a remote-friendly work environment. * To address engineer feedback, the format shifted from passive lectures to **hands-on practical sessions** focusing on AI implementation. * Specific technical workshops demonstrated how to use tools like **Claude Code** and **ChatGPT** to automate workflows, such as generating weekly reports by integrating **Jira tickets with internal Wikis**. * Preparation for these sessions involved creating detailed environment setup guides and troubleshooting protocols to ensure a seamless experience for participating developers. ### Scaling AI Literacy via AI Campus Day * The **AI Campus Day** was a large-scale event designed for over 3,000 participants, aimed at lowering the barrier to entry for AI adoption across all departments. * The "Event & Operation" role involved creating interactive AI photo zones using **Gemini** to familiarize employees with new internal AI tools in a low-pressure setting. * Event production utilized AI-driven assets, including AI-generated voices and icons, to demonstrate the practical utility of these tools within standard business communication and video guides. * The success of the event relied on "participation design," ensuring that even non-technical staff could engage with AI concepts through hands-on play and peer mentoring. For organizations looking to strengthen their technical culture, this experience suggests that integrating new hires into high-impact global projects immediately can be a powerful onboarding tool. Providing DevRel teams the psychological safety to experiment with unconventional marketing and hands-on technical workshops is essential for maintaining developer engagement in a hybrid work era.

HackathonAIGenerative AIGemini+5

woowahan·Dec 19, 2025Original article

Delivering the Future: Global Hackathon (opens in new tab)

The Global Hackathon 2025 served as a massive collaborative initiative to unite over 270 technical employees from seven global entities under DeliveryHero’s umbrella, including Woowa Brothers. By leveraging the community-building expertise of the Woowahan DevRel team, the event successfully bridged geographical and technical gaps to foster innovation in "Delivering the Future." The hackathon concluded with high-level recognition from global leadership and a strategic partnership with Google Cloud, demonstrating the power of synchronized global technical synergy. ## Strategic Planning and Global Coordination * The event adopted a hybrid "Base Camp" model, where participants worked from their local entity offices while staying connected through 24-hour live streaming and centralized online channels. * Organizers meticulously navigated the logistical hurdles of spanning 70 countries, including coordinating across vastly different time zones and respecting local public holidays and vacation seasons. * Efficiency was maintained through a decentralized communication strategy, using entity-specific meetings and comprehensive guidebooks rather than frequent global meetings to prevent "meeting fatigue" across time zones. ## Technical Infrastructure and Regulatory Compliance * To accommodate diverse technical preferences, the infrastructure had to support various stacks, including AWS, Google Cloud Platform (GCP), and specific machine learning models. * The central organization team addressed complex regulatory challenges, ensuring all sandbox environments complied with strict global security standards and GDPR (EU General Data Protection Regulation). * A strategic partnership with Google Cloud provided a standardized Google AI-based environment, enabling teams to experiment rapidly with mature tools and cloud-native services. ## Local Operations and Cross-Entity Collaboration * Physical office spaces were transformed into immersive hackathon hubs to maintain the high-intensity atmosphere characteristic of offline coding marathons. * The event encouraged "office sharing" between entities located in the same city and even supported travel for members to join different regional base camps, fostering a truly global networking culture. * Local supporters used standardized checklists and operational frameworks to ensure a consistent experience for participants, whether they were in Seoul, Berlin, or Dubai. Building a successful global technical event requires a delicate balance between centralized infrastructure and local autonomy. For organizations operating across multiple regions, investing in shared technical sandboxes and robust communication frameworks is essential for turning fragmented local talent into a unified global innovation engine.

HackathonAIMachine LearningSecurity+4

line·Aug 7, 2025Original article

Hey, won't you become a (opens in new tab)

Hack Day 2025 serves as a cornerstone of LY Corporation’s engineering culture, bringing together diverse global teams to innovate beyond their daily operational scopes. By fostering a high-intensity environment focused on creative freedom, the event facilitates technical growth and strengthens interpersonal bonds across international branches. This 19th edition demonstrated how rapid prototyping and cross-functional collaboration can transform abstract ideas into functional AI-driven prototypes within a strict 24-hour window. ### Structure and Participation Dynamics * The hackathon follows a "9 to 9" format, providing exactly 24 hours of development time followed by a day for presentations and awards. * Participation is inclusive of all roles, including developers, designers, planners, and HR staff, allowing for holistic product development. * Teams can be "General Teams" from the same legal entity or "Global Mixed Teams" comprising members from different regions like Korea, Japan, Taiwan, and Vietnam. * The Developer Relations (DevRel) team facilitates team building for remote employees using digital collaboration tools like Zoom and Miro. ### AI-Powered Personality Analysis Project * The author's team developed a "Scouter" program inspired by Dragon Ball, designed to measure professional "combat power" based on communication history. * The system utilizes Slack bots and AI models to analyze message logs and map them to the Big 5 Personality traits (Openness, Conscientiousness, Extraversion, Agreeableness, and Neuroticism). * Professional metrics are visualized as game-like character statistics to make personality insights engaging and less intimidating. * While the original plan involved using AI to generate and print physical character cards, hardware failures with photo printers forced a technical pivot to digital file downloads. ### High-Pressure Presentation and Networking * Every team is allotted a strict 90-second window to pitch their product and demonstrate a live demo. * The "90-second rule" includes a mandatory microphone cutoff to maintain momentum and keep the large-scale event engaging for all attendees. * Dedicated booth sessions follow the presentations, allowing participants to provide hands-on experiences to colleagues and judges. * The event emphasizes "Perfect the Details," a core company value, by encouraging teams to utilize all available resources—from whiteboards to AI image generators—within the time limit. ### Environmental Support and Culture * The event occupies an entire office floor, providing a high-density yet comfortable environment designed to minimize distractions during the "Hack Time." * Cultural exchange is encouraged through "humanity snacks," where participants from different global offices share local treats in dedicated rest areas. * Strategic scheduling, such as "Travel Days" for international participants, ensures that teams can focus entirely on technical execution once the event begins. Participating in internal hackathons provides a vital platform for testing new technologies—like LLMs and personality modeling—that may not fit into immediate product roadmaps. For organizations with hybrid work models, these intensive in-person events are highly recommended to bridge the communication gap and build lasting trust between global teammates.

HackathonAIGenerative AIPrompt Engineering+5

figma·Oct 18, 2017·3 min readCurated summary

How to throw a design-friendly hackathon | Figma Blog

Hackathons have traditionally centered on engineers, but design is now essential to building successful technology products. To attract and retain designers, organizers must deliberately recruit them, communicate the event’s creative value, make applications inclusive, and provide design-focused support. Hack@Brown’s experience shows that these efforts can raise designer participation to roughly one-fifth of attendees. ## Why Hackathons Need Designers - Early hackathons were created around programming and engineering, reinforcing the idea that they were primarily for coders. - As design became a major product differentiator, hackathons began seeking stronger collaboration between designers and engineers. - Hack@Brown, Brown University’s annual event with more than 500 participants, experimented with different approaches and reached about 20% designer participation by 2017. ## Recruit Designers Directly - Designers often do not encounter hackathon promotions through computer-science networks. - Organizers should contact: - University art departments - Campus design clubs and social groups - Local art and design schools - Hack@Brown reached out to institutions including RISD, Parsons, and Northeastern’s design club, Scout. - Organizers with personal connections to design communities have an advantage, but broader outreach is necessary to build awareness. ## Market the Creative Opportunity - Generic messaging such as “24 hours” and “loads of prizes” may not appeal to designers. - Promotional materials should demonstrate strong visual design and involve artists or visual thinkers on the organizing team. - Hack@Brown replaced conventional hacker-focused messaging with “Make, play, learn,” emphasizing creativity, collaboration, and experimentation. - The goal is to show designers that they can make meaningful contributions to hackathon teams. ## Create an Inclusive Application Process - Application systems can unintentionally favor experienced engineers or exclude candidates from nontraditional backgrounds. - Organizers can use: - A lottery system with reserved designer spaces - A separate evaluation process for design applicants - Design experts to help review applications - Hack@Brown received about 3,000 applications for 500 places and used representation targets, including at least 15% designers, 50% women, and 20–30% first-time hackathon participants. - Broader participation produced more varied and innovative projects. ## Build a Design-Friendly Event - Recruiting designers is not enough; the event must also support their needs and make them feel included. - Useful initiatives include: - Design workshops before or during the hackathon - UX/UI introductions for participants unfamiliar with design - Designer mixers to help attendees build community - Design mentors, especially those with coding experience - Design recruiters offering job and internship opportunities - Hack@Brown scheduled its event shortly after Brown and RISD career fairs so recruiters could meet many potential candidates efficiently. ## Recognize Designers - The article begins a section on rewarding designers to encourage them to return and recommend the event to others, but the provided text ends before describing the specific reward strategies. A design-friendly hackathon requires intentional outreach, inclusive selection, relevant programming, and visible support for design participants. Treating designers as equal contributors—not as an afterthought—helps create stronger teams and more innovative projects.

Read original(opens in new tab)

HackathonUser ExperienceCollaborative DesignDesign Thinking+2