Collecting available resources that might make it easier for the teams to achieve more within the 24-hour timespan - including helpful data sets or technology APIs - is critical to any hackathon. Especially one that's happening over such a short time-span.
Below is a collection of resource I put together for participants in the Hack4Humanity event:
BACKGROUND & INFORMATION SOURCES
- Quick facts: What you need to know about the Syria crisis
- Syria’s Refugee Crisis in Numbers
- Collection: Online Refugee Information Services
- Multi-Sector Needs Assessment of Syrian Refugees Residing in Host Communities (PDF)
- Mass Communications Assessments of Syrian Refugees
- RefugeeProjects.com (database)
DATA & TECH
Data Collections
- Syria Regional Refugee Response Inter-agency Information Sharing Portal: The Syrian refugee situation data portal will be updated with the latest figures at 18 May 2016
- Common Operational Datasets: Critical datasets that are used to support the work of humanitarian actors across multiple sectors. They are considered a de facto standard for the humanitarian community and should represent the best-available datasets for each theme.
- Humanitarian Data Exchange: The Humanitarian Data Exchange (HDX) is an open platform for sharing data. The goal of HDX is to make humanitarian data easy to find and use for analysis.
- UN Data Catalog: Provides a comprehensive and representative overview of UN system open data assets, including:
- UN Development Programme - https://data.undp.org/
- UNICEF - http://data.unicef.org/
- UNHCR (UN Refugee Agency) - http://data.unhcr.org/ (API documentation)
- World Food Programme - http://www.wfp.org/fais/
- World Health Organization - http://www.who.int/gho/en/
- World Bank - http://data.worldbank.org/ (API)
- International Labor Organization - http://www.ilo.org/global/statistics-and-databases/lang--en/index.htm
- UN HABITAT - http://urbandata.unhabitat.org/ (API)
- UN Statistical data - http://unstats.un.org
- ReliefWeb
Open Source Tech & APIs
- RapidPro:Allows you to easily design, pilot, and scale services that connect directly with a mobile phone user...without the help of a software developer. (API) (Developer Documentation)
- Ushahidi: An open source project which allows users to crowdsource crisis information to be sent via mobile. (on Github)
- CartoDB: Platform for rapid development of geospatial apps. CartoDB will be on hand to provide instances, help, and some carbon sequestration potential data during the event. (APIs)
- Sourcemap: Realtime supply chain mapping around the world. (API)
- KoboToolbox: A suite of tools for field data collection for use in challenging environments. Our software is free and open source.
- International Rescue Committee on Github
- Artificial Intelligence for Disaster Response (on Github)
IBM
- Data Scientist Workbench: “Enables you to explore, prepare, refine, analyze, and visualize data interactively & collaboratively with open source tools.”
- IBM Bluemix: “The cloud platform to accelerate innovation on both sides of the firewall.”
- Watson Analytics: “Delivers cloud-based guided analytics, data visualization and predictive analytics that make understanding data easier.”
OTHER TOOLS
Identifying Needs
- Why-How Laddering: When you think about the needs of someone, you can use why-how laddering to flesh out a number of needs, and find a middle stratum of needs that are both meaningful and actionable.
- Empathy Mapping: Good design is grounded in an understanding of the person for whom you are designing. An Empathy Map is one tool to help you synthesize your observations and draw out unexpected insights.
- Point of View Statement: A point-of-view (POV) is your reframing of a design challenge into an actionable problem statement that will launch you into generative ideation.
(Credit to the Lincoln Initiative’s Refugee Hackathon for much of the collection below • original here.)
UI Prototyping
- FluidUI
- Invision App
- Marvel App
- Origami
- Balsamiq
- Wireframe Templates
- Free Wireframe Templates
- US Digital Service Open Source Tools for Hierarchy & Accessibility
Web Application Host
Hosting your application, if required, is going to take considerable time. This should be the next step if you are looking to build your website or create a client-side prototype. Such service include:
Code Libraries & Frameworks
Experience with these frameworks will help you prototype your client-side functionality, but build and understanding your actual product much faster than utilizing online tools.
HTML Boilerplates
- https://html5boilerplate.com
- http://getskeleton.com
- http://tympanus.net/codrops/category/blueprints/
- HTML Cheat Sheets
Front-End UI and Responsive Grid Frameworks
Core Javascript libraries
Javascript frameworks
API Integration
APIs makes it possible for applications to share data and take actions on one another's behalf without requiring developers to share all of their software's code. This is how websites are able to integrate things such as Google Maps, Instagram, or Facebook features to their application. See the links below for more information.
Version Control
Version control is a system that records changes to a file or set of files over time so that you can recall specific versions later.
INSPIRATION
Case Studies
- Studying Tech Use in Syrian Refugee Camp
- How technology is helping deliver aid to Syrian refugees in the Middle East
- Exploring the role of data science in assisting UN relief efforts in Syria
- BitNation Emergency Response
Other Refugee-Related Hackathons
- March 25 - 27, 2016: Borderless Hack (Istanbul Turkey)
- February 26 - 28, 2016: Hack The Global Refugee Crisis (Silicon Valley)
- Access the best ideas’ presentation decks here *
- Lighthouse video made for the folks interesting in testing this solution in the field: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=klge4hkrcH0
- Volunteer X walkthrough to educate NGOs about their platform
- February 17, 2016: Europe In Turmoil Hackathon (Tufts University)
- February 9, 2016: Techfugees NY Creative Conference (New York)
- February 6th, 2016:Sheffield Refugee Hackathon (Sheffield, United Kingdom)
- Access some of their ideas here
- Access their problem statements here (scroll down)
- February 5th - 6th, 2016:Hacks/Hackers Refugee Hackathon (Amsterdam)
- December 2015:Code The Road Europe - The Hamburg Hackathon For Refugees (Hamburg)
- November 24-25, 2015:Refugee Hackathon (Liverpool, Australia)
- 1st Place Project
- October 24-25, 2015:Refugee Hackathon (Berlin, Germany)
- GitHub Repository of their projects
- Photos
- October 23, 2015:Design For Humanity (The Netherlands)
- October 17, 2015:Refugee Helper Hackathon (Hamburg, Germany)
- June 3, 2014:MyUNCHR Hackathon (Jordan, Amman)
Other
- Ideas You Can Use
- Helpful links from the field
- World Economic Forum
POTENTIAL PARTNERS
- Techfugees
- Standby Taskforce
- RefugeeBoard.de
- Info-Compass.eu
- SocialProHub.org
- For-Good.io
- Mapping Europe Refugees' Aid
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