The Random Hacks of Kindness hackathon is currently underway. Developers came in good numbers to hack for a good cause. The event started off with Erik Hersman giving a presentation as an introduction and background to the problem definitions of the hackathon.

Erik makes his presentation

Attendees have set themselves into groups based on the RHOK problem definitions. These are:-

• Res Q: This team picked the Person-Finder problem. They intend to make use of both web and mobile technologies to solve this problem. The web module will be used by rescue teams to locate people, while the mobile module will be used to Register, make reports on the ground, and follow up/monitor people you know.

Res-Q make their presentation

• Eneza: This team chose to work on the I Need Help problem. They split themselves into two core teams, web and mobile. The web will be used to receive emergency SMS feeds and forward them to SAR Teams. The SMS solution will be used to create distress messages to be sent to the website. A desktop widget will be used to aggregate SAR messages.

• WAVE : This team decided to work on the WeHaveWeNeed Application. They decided to work on a web prototype and report on improvements. They subdivided themselves into 3 teams, the We Have Team, the We Need Team, and the Matching team.

• KJ&KB: This team decide to work on the browser alerts. Their solution is an SMS based application that will send SMS’s to a particular location incase of a disaster that people need to be notified about. The application will have an input file and phone numbers to send SMS to. It will also be able to generate a URL to pass to the kernel.

• AMP: They decided to work on the Haiti AMPs Network. Their solution to this problem was to have Amputee registration via SMS and Web platforms using USSD.

• O-Funds: This team decided to work on the The money tracker/ where did my money go problem. They will work on a web platform and come up with a virtual payment system.

We spoke to the RHOK Nairobi Judges Conrad Akunga, John Wesonga, Billy Odero and Emmanuel Kala, who said they were very optimistic and impressed by the solutions each group came up with. They were optimistic that the teams will successfully implement their ideas despite the short time frame, and also hoped that the development will continue even after the event ends tomorrow.

We’ll be back with more updates on the progress each team is making .

Watch the live stream here.

Photos from the event are available here.