MecSimCalc Hackathon 5.0 (January 21st - January 28th, 2023) Winners
At the beginning of 2023, MecSimCalc ran our sixth hackathon. This competition sponsored by 1984 Ventures and echo3D, was aimed to showcase MecSimCalc as a platform for creating web applications in Python. The theme for this hackathon was "Creating a calculator that you would use for one of your classes". Users created an app on the MecSimCalc website, tagged it as "Comp01212023" and published it for a chance to win $100. Throughout the competition there were 66 sign-ups and 8 submissions. This blog post is dedicated to the top 5 scoring apps from MecSimCalc's January 21st - January 28th, 2023 Hackathon 5.0. To view all apps submitted during the competition, you can check out this collection: Hackathon 5.0 Submissions.
| App | Author(s) | Win |
|---|---|---|
| Annualized Rate of Return | Philippe Saint-Amand | Grand Prize Winner ($100) |
| Offset-C | Devaraja G | Top 5 App |
| Visualizer | Raj Kumar | Top 5 App |
| Equation Balancer | Pulkit Govrani | Top 5 App |
| Black Scholes | Amysoj J A Exson Joseph | Top 5 App |
Annualized Rate of Return (Grand Prize Winner)
Philippe Saint-Amand
About Me
My name is Philippe and I live in Belgium.
I’m eager to learn and in my free time, I love playing around with Python and test libraries in various area : Data Analytics, Security, Web Development, Image processing, Geolocation/Geomapping, …
So when I saw a site where the key message is “Create and share your Python web apps in minutes for free”, I have of course to test it!
I added also an extra challenge by participating to my first hackathon. So I’m really astonished but very proud about the end result.
About my app and why I made it
As the theme of the hackathon was creating a calculator, I was first thinking of traditional conversion calculator (like height, weight, distance, etc.) as I’m from Europe & you are from North America.
Meanwhile It sounds too simple & I want also to try the possibility to display some visuals (what sounds difficult with a conversion calculator).
Then comes to me this idea of Annualized RoR with also explanation of compound interest. Also, the Annualized RoR is really useful if you want to compare different possible investments & not so straight forward to obtain by doing mental calculation (at least for me 😉). So I can indeed rely on a tool for this calculation & this can be useful for others as well so a good reason to publish on a web site.
My experience with MecSimCalc
I have to say MecSimCalc is really easy to use & it corresponds to my philosophy of working. Indeed, my side I prefer to work on the business logic part (backend side) of an app and don’t want to pass too much time developing the frontend part. So having a framework proposing me a no-code approach for the presentation part meets my expectations. Your idea to have a reach text editor, a collection of input fields with pre-validation of parameter values is really great.
For the input part, I was able to very quickly present/document the app using text editor (instead of HTML or Markdown that will takes more time). The default template of presentation is good. Of course there is no possibility to have too much customization but for me, at the moment I have a default nice layout, I have no problem to stitch to it. The only issue I have seen is related to the mobile view (see more details at the end of this e-mail)
For the output part, integrating Jinja to a rich text editor instead of HTML is just awesome.
Black Scholes (Top 5 App)
About Amysoj J A Exson Joseph
I am a computer science engineering student in my final year, hailing from Tamil Nadu, India. Building websites and native applications is a hobby of mine, and I am eager to take the skills and knowledge I have gained through my studies to the next level. I am excited to see where my interests in technology will take me in the future.
About my App
I built a Black-Scholes option pricing calculator app to provide a simple and user-friendly interface for determining option prices. My goal is to support informed decision-making in finance by combining my technical and financial knowledge.
My experience with MecSimCalc
I recently started using MecSimCalc and I am thoroughly impressed with its capabilities. As a Python developer, I appreciate the ease with which I can create and share web applications with just a few clicks. The platform's intuitive interface and streamlined process have saved me so much time and effort compared to other similar tools I have used in the past. I highly recommend MecSimCalc to any Python developer looking for a fast and simple way to create and share web applications.
We are hosting another hackathon from March 18th - March 25th 2023. For a chance to win $100, please check out the DevPost to find out more!
