Call for Code - Joining Hands Against #COVID19 & Climate Change

In our last post on Call for Code, we spoke about the program, its purpose for the 2020 challenge, and why developers should participate in the same. Well, let's do a quick recap of our last post; the five-year global challenge Call for Code is back, and you can submit your open source solutions till July 31st, 2020. This year the Challenge has two tracks, one is to take a stab on COVID-19, and the other is to reverse the impact of climate change and how technology can help fight these two pressing issues.

Process to Participate

The first step is to register with a free IBM account and join solution architects, data scientists, developers, and other participants who have provided their solutions in previous’ year challenges and ones who have stepped up for 2020.

Once the account is created you will be able to access technical content across four key technology areas AI, Data Science, Platform Development, and Internet of Things. The technical repository contains code patterns, data sets, RedHat on IBM Cloud platform, videos, blogs, and tutorials.

For developers who don't have an idea, the IBM repository has starter kits which are one-stop guides for participants to understand the problem, limit the scope, and identify use cases around which solutions can be built. These kits will give a clearer picture of how technology can play a crucial role in providing solutions to simple day to day activities like minimizing queues by converting them to on-demand virtual lines. The starter kits are across use cases of crisis communication, remote education, community operation with additional tutorials on the use of statistical tools to analyze COVID-19 and climate change data and how can blockchain be utilized and deep learning is used to have a take on both of the issues. For climate change, a group of experts met in Geneva to develop templates for starter kits to get a better understanding of use cases and get started with your ideas.

Get on Speed and Start Developing

Once you have a structured idea around the use case you can find teammates, meet experts, ask the right questions around your prototype, share ideas, and contribute to the Call for Code community.

Once the solution is ready, only one team member from the team should submit the solution, while all the participating members should accept the Call for Code agreement. In the submission, you must mention details of your solution along with the details on how it was built. This will not only give you a chance to win prize money of $200,000 but also your solution will be built for use.

Solutions have already started to pour-in from developers across the world, on how technology can help assist in the times on climate change and pandemic. How can we attain water and energy sustainability and disaster resiliency due to climate change caused by us? How small businesses can be back on track and find assistance? How better should the queue be managed? How can we bring the right medical advice to the needy?

If you will take a pause and comprehend, you will realize that technology has a massive role to play to look at the climate and the recent disease with a different lens, be it by educating children when schools are closed, helping communities by distributing limited resources or coming up with sustainable solutions for a better earth. This platform will give an opportunity to create an open-source solution that will benefit society and make an immediate and lasting impact on the world.

Why wait? Get set go! Accept the Call for Code challenge, build with open source tech, find your squad, and submit your idea.