512-750-9220

silona@leagueoftechvoters.com

The League of Technical Voters

For Immediate Release:                                                              April 19th, 2007

Open Source Codeathon in Austin Texas

Austin, Texas 4-19-2007

After the success of their acclaimed inaugural event, a 48-hour Codeathon last October, The League of Technical Voters, now in conjunction with Knowbility, is at it again.  This round is a two-weekend event, consisting of a Designathon and a Codeathon, with a determined focus on creating free software for non-profit companies.

The Designathon was held this past Saturday, with over a dozen software development and design professionals coming together to design software for this weekend's Codeathon.  Designers collaborated on issues of usability and accessibility, graphical interface design and high-level software architecture.

Starting at 12pm this Saturday, on April 21st, teams of highly skilled volunteer programmers will convene at Tek Republic at 5331 Burnet Road for a 24-hour Codeathon, to implement the designers' ideas. Throughout the weekend, supporters will energize the coders with several of food, drinks and unique entertainment breaks including a superhero rampage, midnight martinis, and more.  A kick-off party for the event will heald at 7pm on Friday, April 20th, at Triumph Cafe on 3308 Spicewood Springs Road.

A variety of non-profit organizations have already expressed interest in the software, which includes enhancements to existing packages, such as adding accessibility functionality, an initiative championed by Knowbility and creation of new applications to help NPOs with revenue generation, such as a drop-in donations widget for bloggers. The software produced during the event, while targeted to non-profits, will be open source and readily available for anyone who would like to use it. 

A partnership with the Austin Time Exchange Network will also reward Codeathon participants with 30 hours of Time Exchange Shares. The Austin Time Exchange is a non-profit organization that builds community assets by matching unmet resources with unmet needs. These Shares can be exchanged with other network participants for any personal services, from house cleaning to violin lessons to technical consulting.

More details and sign-up can be found on the event wiki: http://codeathon.pbwiki.com

For more information contact:

Silona I Bonewald

silona@leagueoftechvoters.org  512-750-9220