A hackathon is essentially a code-sprint. Imagine running a marathon - except you're doing it by writing code. The reasons are many, and depend a lot on what y

A hackathon is essentially a code-sprint. Imagine running a marathon - except you're doing it by writing code. The reasons are many, and depend a lot on what you want from the hackathon and what others (the ones you'll be hacking with want). For example, in a small company setting, hackathons are great to implement features or fix-bugs that have been lying around for a while. It's a concentrated effort to get something done. In a medium sized setting, a hackathon might serve the purpose more of enabling newbies (or people from outside a certain team) to get to know another team's code-base and philosophy. In a slightly larger sized company setting, a hackathon might just be more about idea exchange and getting to know people simply because there might be a lack of focus with so many people around. That's just my take on hackathons. I'm sure there are other more interesting views on it. And whatever you do, please sleep well and eat healthy when you're participating in one.