Hackathons, bugathons, and testathons are all types of events that bring together developers, testers, and other tech-savvy individuals to collaborate on projects and solve problems. These events often take place over the course of a day or a weekend, and participants work in teams to come up with innovative solutions to challenges.
Hackathons
Hackatons are typically focused on creating new software or applications. Participants work together to brainstorm ideas, and then quickly prototype and develop their creations. This can be a great opportunity for individuals to learn new skills, test out their creative ideas, and get feedback from other participants. But due to their “quick and dirty” nature, code integrity (or quality) isn’t the focus of the participants, and hence quality-minded people (such as QA engineers) have to search for other types of marathons in which they can utilize their skills.
Bugathons
Bugathons, for example, are focused on identifying and fixing bugs in existing software. Participants work together to find and fix bugs in a particular application or system. This can be a great way for developers to improve the quality of their code, and for organizations to improve their products. Bugathons usually test end-to-end behaviors with respect to a product definition of spec, and therefore, by nature, they are very inclusive (i.e. anyone can join regardless of their background). Because of their inclusive nature, Bugathons are sometimes held within an organization to get everyone on board and share the excitement towards a new major software release or product launch.
Testathons
Testathrons are similar to bugathons, but with a focus on testing rather than finding and fixing bugs. Hence, the participants are QA and testers. Participants work together to understand the functionality, write tests and test the functionality of a particular application or system. This is the equivalent of the hackathon experience but for testers.
Overall, hackathons, bugathons, and testathons are fun and exciting ways for individuals and organizations to come together and collaborate on projects. These events can provide a great opportunity for learning, creativity, and problem-solving.
The Integrithon – a new type of marathon
The Integrithon is an event where teams of developers come together to work on improving the code integrity of software modules (unit tests, micro tests, component tests, etc.). Participants would work together to identify and fix bugs, improve code coverage, and enhance the overall quality of the code.
During the marathon:
- The teams would likely use unit testing to ensure that their code is as high-quality as possible. This could involve running a series of tests on different parts of the code to check for bugs and other issues.
- The teams would then work together to fix any problems they find and to improve the code coverage of the application.
- The teams may decide to manually write their own unit tests (which has the advantage of being most familiar with the code) or use automated test code generation tools such as qodo.ai (for meaningful tests and speeding up the process).
- At the end of the marathon, the teams would present their work to a panel of judges, who would evaluate the code based on its quality, coverage, and overall integrity. The winning team would be the one that has made the most significant improvements to the code and has achieved the highest level of code integrity.
In a nutshell, a code integrity marathon would be a fun and exciting way for developers to collaborate and improve the quality of their code. It would provide a great opportunity for learning, problem-solving, and creativity, and could help organizations release better products with fewer bugs.
Dedy Kredo
Alexander Wenel
