Ghent Functional Programming Group/BelHac

About

The Haskell Hackathon is an international, grassroots collaborative coding festival with a simple focus: build and improve Haskell libraries, tools, and infrastructure.

BelHac will be held on 5-7 November 2010 in "The Therminal" in Ghent, Belgium. It is open to all -- you do not have to be a Haskell guru to attend. All you need is a basic knowledge of Haskell, a willingness to learn, and a project you're excited to help with (or a project of your own to work on).

There will be lots of hacking, good beer, and, of course, fun!

• Mailing list: hackathon@haskell.org
• IRC channel: #ghentfpg on FreeNode

You can register here.

News

• October 30: Added details
• July 29: Added a projects page
• July 20: Registration is now open!

When

• Friday, 5th of November: 2pm - 7pm
• Saturday, 6th of November: 10am - 6pm
• Sunday, 7th of November: 10am - 6pm

Program

• Friday: There will be a short Haskell tutorial by BONUS from [1]. The Dutch announcement can be found here. This will be followed by a small symposium on Haskell in the Industry.
• Saturday: Hacking!
• Sunday: More hacking, and in the afternoon we will have a couple of (lightning) talks.

If you'd like to work on a specific project, please consider adding it to the projects page if it is not on there already. Otherwise, add yourself to the list of people who will hack on said project.

Getting there

Getting to Ghent

The nearest airport is the Brussels Airport in Zaventem (code: BRU). The train station connected to this airport has an excellent connection with Ghent (Gent in Dutch). The train schedule is pretty regular and should be more or less the same through the entire day after 9:00 AM -- pending accidents, delays, etc. So just replace the 'hour' of the ride with the hour at which you'll arrive at the train station and you're set. For example, for train reaching Ghent prior to 10AM, the schedule looks as follows.

Time of departure	Time of arrival	Change trains at
7:27 (dir. Nijvel)	8:36	Brussel-Noord (dir. Oostende)
7:52 (dir. De Panne)	8:45
8:10 (dir. Gent, stops everywhere!)	9:35	Brussel-Noord (dir. St.-Niklaas); Dendermonde (dir. Brugge)
8:36 (dir. Quevy)	9:36	Brussel-Noord (dir. Oostende)
8:52 (dir. De Panne)	9:45

Basically, unless the train leaving at the airport is an IC or IR type connected to Ghent and beyond, you are best of when changing trains in Brussels (station Brussel-Noord (North)). There you are best off taking the IC train to either Oostende or Knokke/Blankenberge. In both cases, Ghent St.-Pieters is the first stop after Brussel-Zuid (South) or Bruxelles-Midi (in French), i.e., the third stop if you change train at Brussel-Noord.

Getting to The Therminal

The address of The Therminal is

 Hoveniersberg 24
 9000 Gent
 Belgium

Here is a map.

The Therminal is located in a very small street directly next to a bookshop called "Acco". Here's an illustration:

Follow this small street, and you will see signs pointing to the Therminal.

Food

Here is a map of handy locations. We will provide food during lunch, and on Friday evening, there will be a reception. In the evening, we will probably break up in subgroups and go to nearby restaurants. If you're looking for a place to get coffee, we recommend you take a look at koffiemetplets.

Accommodation

Since Ghent is quite a tourist city, you should have no problems finding a place to stay.

Some pointers:

• De Draecke, a youth hostel in the center of Ghent.
• IBIS St.-Baafs, a 2-star hotel in the center of Ghent.
• IBIS Opera, a 2-star hotel in the center of Ghent.
• Best Western Chamade, a 3-star hotel near Ghent St.-Pieters train station.
• Monasterium hotel, a 3-star hotel in the center of Ghent, in a fully refurbished building dating back to 1278.
• NH Gent Belfort, a 4-star hotel in the center of Ghent.
• Ghent Marriott, a 4-star hotel in the center of Ghent.
• Visit Ghent, the Ghent tourist board.

What to bring

• A laptop with a wireless card. Ethernet access might be available, but don't count on it. If you really need ethernet access, contact the organizers.
• There is a projector available if someone wants to give a talk.

Sponsors

BelHac is sponsored by Well-Typed, The Haskell Consultants.

Incubaid is also sponsoring the Hackathon.

O'Reilly is sponsoring the Hackathon as well.

We're still looking for sponsors to help us provide food, drinks and t-shirts. If you or your company are interested in sponsoring, please contact one of the organizers.

Organizers & Contact

The GhentFPG organizing committee is behind this Hackaton. You can contact us at

• Jasper Van der Jeugt (irc: jaspervdj, email: jaspervdj+belhac@gmail.com, phone: +32-476-26-48-47)