Countless technologies awaited the hackers, from speech processing and neuro-headbands to 3D printing and virtual/augmented reality to smart hardware building blocks. They had access to 25 mentors, who trained them immediately in the use of any technology they chose. Each team chose one challenge corresponding to a specific problem faced by a person with disabilities. The people submitting challenges included for example Hanka, who created a system of buttons for her sister with cerebral palsy – which has empowered her to communicate with others and entertain herself. Hanka, a student of psychology, brought her project to #AimtecHackathon so that IT enthusiasts could help her out and push this solution yet another step ahead.
The jury members came from the organiser (Aimtec) and from among tech mentors and project clients. They ultimately declared The Surviving House Spiders as the winners. This team – which also won the audience prize – tackled a problem submitted by Zdeněk, a former Aimtec employee. A serious car accident has left him unable to keep up with speech on television. The team managed to fulfil his assignment 100% – creating understandable slowed-down sound and slowing the video along with it to ensure that the viewer doesn’t miss a thing. Second place went to ByteMe – this team aimed to ease the lives of people with blindness, working from an assignment submitted by their friend Lukáš. They chose the route of an app that can quickly identify individual objects, such as food items in a pantry, using NFC chips. Third place went to Grind Machine, which focused on aiding people with injuries to their spinal cord and vocal tract. Using neural networks, the team taught a new system to recognise facial expressions and thereby control a computer and other smart devices. A special prize for the best use of AWS was awarded to The Drowned Ones, which focused on slowing narrated text.
Just as in past years, this weekend hacker marathon was supplemented by TechTalks, a series of tech presentations with speakers who had special insight into how much code can help. Ondřej Vyhnal from Otto Bock ČR presented smart arm and leg prosthetics, and Petr Raška from IKEM tied into this by demonstrating how techs like 3D printing and augmented reality are used in hospital practice. Petr Uličný from BENETRONIC presented the Czech invention MouthMouse and the ChytréPomůcky.cz (“SmartAids”) platform – both great examples of how much can be achieved even with limited resources. This year’s TechTalks were wrapped up by Josef Navrátil from DronySIT, who showed how drones save the lives of people who explore dangerous locations or respond to fires.
On Sunday, the Moving Station was taken over by the YoungHackers children’s programme, which presented tech gadgets and the region’s educational opportunities, in collaboration with education and hobby organisations.
#AimtecHackathon is organised by Aimtec. Through this event, the company supports technical education and IT awareness among the public at large. This year has brought us up to the seventh Hackathon, which includes – besides the HackIT programming marathon – the TechTalks tech-presentation series and the YoungHackers children’s programme. For more information on this project, visit www.aimtechackathon.cz.
Moving Station, Pilsen
HackIT – programming marathon. Partners: Amazon Web Services, Dratek.cz, The Faculty of Applied Sciences at the University of West Bohemia in Pilsen, Happenee, HARDWARIO, iNFINITE Production, KATing, Charter 77 Foundation – Barriers Account, Luxonis, RPishop.cz, RVtech.cz, the City of Pilsen’s IT Administration and SpeechTech.
TechTalks – public lectures. Partners: BENETRONIC, DronySIT, IKEM, Otto Bock CR.
YoungHackers – a play-filled afternoon for children. Partners: ABC, BotFactory, Campo Arduino, Gymnázium + SOŠ Rokycany, nvias, Radovánek Leisure Time Centre, VOŠ a SPŠE Plzeň.
This event took place with the fantastic support of the Moving Station team and wonderful catering by Robert Šlajs.