DevOps Services and BlueMix POC App Challenge

1. Contest Overview

Have a small application you’ve been working on? Trying to learn a new technology? This contest lets you build and write about an exciting app that interests YOU. As part of this contest, we want you to create a small, nimble, useful (solves a contemporary problem) and usable application that provides educational value for other developers. Once you create your app, write a short article about the process of building it—with accompanying screen shots—so that others can learn from what you’ve done. We’ll help edit your article before publishing the code and accompanying article  on IBM’s developerWorks site—which gets over 3.5 million views a month!

2. Start Here!

• Register at BlueMix and IBM DevOps Services
• Check out a couple great examples of articles with code that have been written already—you’ll aim to produce a shorter version of these articles.
  • https://www.ibm.com/developerworks/library/wa-nodejs-app/
  • http://www.ibm.com/developerworks/library/mo-android-push-app/index.html
  • http://www.ibm.com/developerworks/library/wa-nodejs-polling-app/
  • https://www.ibmdw.net/bluemix/docs/articles/

3. Application Requirements

1. Your source code must be created and stored in a DevOps Services  (previously called JazzHub) private project using git deployment and you need to add <co-pilot name> as a project member.
2. The application should be created to use one or more of the following program languages; Scala, go, java, node.js, php or ruby and deployed using BlueMix services. To learn how to deploy an app to BlueMix, watch this 5 minute video.
3. Your application code must be deployed and running in the BlueMix environment. Check out our quick BlueMix getting-started guide to understand the basics.
4. The submitted developed sample application code must be distributed under open source contribution terms such as under an Apache, BSD, or MIT license in DevOps Services (and other targeted communities)
5. Your article must explain the purpose of your app and show, with easy-to-follow steps and screen captures to illustrate, how a developer could create or extend their own app using services in BlueMix. The article will be written in a manner to (1) show code, (2) run code, (3) fork code.
6. Submitters will participate in a brief survey on their use of the BlueMix DevOps development and other services.

 

 

 

 

4. Checkpoint Requirements

The checkpoint submission deadline is: May 27, 21:00 EST. Any submission received after that will not be considered.

This contest has a checkpoint (at the midway - after 4 days) prior to final submission, where article abstract will be reviewed and approved.

Five checkpoint prizes worth $300 will be awarded.

Checkpoint requirements

Please submit the following as a part of your checkpoint submission:

• Proposed article title
• Short explanation of your app and article idea. Please be sure to answer the following questions:
  • What does it help people learn?
  • What services would it use?
• Optional: Include pointer to sample code in DevOps services private project

Please submit a brief abstract explaining high level idea of your project which you can allow to make public. Please specify if you do not want any specific part to be public. This is very important. Clients want to use your checkpoint submission for some public showcasing and hence if you do not provide this abstract, they reserve the right to publish any or all parts of your checkpoint submission.

Please Note: The checkpoint round is optional but highly recommended for early and valuable feedback and drawing client's attention. You can still submit in final round if you could not make it to checkpoint.

5. Judging Criteria

Final code and article content will be tested and quality assured by client/co-pilot review. Submitted apps and articles will be judged on several criteria.

• Creativity
• Use of IBM BlueMix services (ie, use of Cloudant, DataCash, etc)
• Degree of problem solved (ie  code answers a question on stack overflow)
• Outreach to include other social media venues (like Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook)
• Quality of code towards its instructional value
• Depth of BlueMix DevOps services usage (ie, plan, deploy)
• Completeness of written instructional portion

6. Prizes

There are three final prizes and five checkpoint prizes.

Final Prizes:

1st Place: $2500

2md Place: $1500

3rd Place: $1000

Checkpoint Prizes

5 prizes: $300 each