HackFest
HackFest is an Apple II programming competition held over the course of KansasFest every year and open to all attendees. The following archive of past HackFest entries serves as an example of the creativity and methods this competition inspires among KansasFest attendees; the rules under which they were created follow.
| Year | Author | Title | Place | Format | Alternative |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1998 | Michael Hackett | WordWorks Pro pop-up blocker | 1st | ||
| 1998 | Pim Blokland | Finder desktop color changer | 2nd | ||
| 1998 | Ken Gagne | GSoft BASIC Boggled | 3rd | ||
| 1998 | Geoff Weiss | ||||
| 1999 | Ken Gagne | Spectrum address book | 1st | ||
| 1999 | Shawn Beattie | GSoft BASIC countdown to Y][KFest | 2nd | ||
| 1999 | Richard Bennett | Erratic iMac-like mouse behavior | 3rd | ||
| 1999 | Jeff Blakeney | File compression utility | 4th | ||
| 1999 | Cindy Adams | Simple Spectrum script | 5th | ||
| 2000 | Geoff Weiss | Taipan | 1st | ||
| 2000 | Ken Gagne | Maxster | 2nd | BXY | BSC |
| 2000 | Margaret Anderson | AppleWorks macro | 3rd | ||
| 2000 | Jeff Blakeney | Spectrum Checkers | 4th | ||
| 2000 | Jamie Hodges | Applesoft dice-rolling | 5th | ||
| 2001 | Margaret Anderson | 1st | |||
| 2001 | Ken Gagne | KISS | 2nd | BXY | BSC |
| 2001 | Geoff Weiss | Spectrum tar | 3rd | ||
| 2001 | Jamie Hodges | 4th | |||
| 2003 | Margaret Anderson | HyperCard-based driving time estimator to local restaurant | 1st | ||
| 2003 | Andrew Roughan | Specification for a Marinetti debugging tool | |||
| 2004 | Eric Shepherd | SideClick | 1st | ||
| 2004 | Geoff Weiss | LanceHack | 2nd | ||
| 2004 | Hans Franke | HELLO WORLD for Replica-1 | 3rd | ||
| 2006 | Margaret Anderson | Sudoku solver | 1st | ||
| 2006 | Eric Shepherd | Finder icon Space Invaders | 2nd | ||
| 2006 | Matthew Schock | BASIC RPG | 3rd | ||
| 2006 | Stavros Karatsoridis | KFest trivia | 4th | ||
| 2006 | Geoff Weiss | Bejeweled | 5th | ||
| 2007 | Michael J Mahon | Nada.Pong | 1st | SDK | |
| 2007 | Andrew Roughan | ShareClip | 2nd | ||
| 2008 | Ryan Suenaga | Bitly CDA | 1st | ||
| 2008 | Margaret Anderson | Game launcher | 2nd | ||
| 2009 | Peter Neubauer | Conway's Game of Life | 1st | SHK | |
| 2009 | Martin Haye | VROOM | 2nd | PO | PNG |
| 2009 | Margaret Anderson | HyperCard-based disk cataloging utility | 3rd | ||
| 2009 | Ryan Suenaga | IPData Reporter CDA 1.0 | 4th | BXY | |
| 2010 | Martin Haye | Wizardry deprotected | 1st | ||
| 2010 | Peter Neubauer | KansasFest Trivia with Complete Pascal and Pegasoft Draw Tools | 2nd | SHK | |
| 2011 | Daniel Kruszyna | Squares | 1st | BXY | PO |
| 2011 | Peter Neubauer | Terrapin & DoubleTalk demo | 2nd | DSK | |
| 2011 | Martin Haye | Haiku-Bot | 3rd | DSK | |
| 2012 | Jeremy Rand | CurtaSim | 1st | DSK | source code |
| 2012 | Jeff Blakeney | Colourfill game | 2nd | ||
| 2012 | Ivan Drucker | Magic GOSUB | 3rd | DSK | BXY |
| 2012 | Scott Miller | A formula fo drawing the word KFest | 4th | ||
| 2012 | Martin Haye | Apple /// crack screen | n/a | DSK | |
| 2012 | Peter Neubauer | Lissajous curve plotter | n/a | DSK | |
| 2012 | Mike Maginnis | Apple III piano | n/a | ||
| 2013 | Margaret Anderson | Eamon mapper | 1st | ||
| 2013 | Geoff Weiss | Teach bug fix and Time control panel update | 2nd | SHK SHK | |
| 2013 | Kevin Savetz | Automatic Structris player | 3rd | ZIP (with DSK and TXT) | |
| 2013 | Jeremy Rand | RPN calculator | 4th | ZIP SHK 2MG | Latest release |
| 2013 | Kelvin Sherlock | KansasFest banner INIT and ORCA/C binary literal support | 5th | Patch | HTTP |
| 2013 | Charles Mangin | KansasFest themed Bard's Tale characters | 6th | DSK | |
| 2013 | Forrest Lowe | Boot tracing tools | 7th | DOC DSK | |
| 2014 | Jeremy Rand | Apple 2048 game | 1st | DSK | Git |
| 2014 | Ivan Hogan | Trig Function Plotter | 2nd | DSK TXT | HTTP |
| 2014 | John Lane | Thorin's Charge Card (Wizardy 4 de-protect) | 3rd | TXT | DSK Notes on DSK |
| 2014 | Charles Mangin | Biofeedback Game | n/a | ZIP | |
| 2015 | Carrington Vanston | Tic-Tac-Toe Game | 1st | ZIP with disk image and source | |
| 2015 | Martin Haye | Apple III Assembler/Disassembler | 2nd | ||
| 2015 | Jeremy Rand | A2Sudoku | 3rd | DSK v1.0 Source ZIP | Github DSK v1.2 (enhanced after HackFest) |
| 2015 | Kevin Savetz | Little Red Google Car (Lit’l Red Bug Autoplayer) | ZIP | ||
| 2015 | Kevin Savetz | Archive.org Disk Image Data Extractor | Shell script | ||
| 2015 | John Leake | OMG Zombies | |||
| 2015 | Forrest Lowe | "3-Sided Record" Disk (multiple sector 0s) | |||
| 2015 | Charles Mangin | Disk Imager | Source on Github | ||
| 2015 | Sarah W | Olympic Decathlon fix | PNG screenshot | ||
| 2016 | Kevin Savetz | Kaverns of KFest | 1st | DSK | GitHub |
| 2016 | Jeremy Rand | Bejeweled | 2nd | DSK | GitHub |
| 2016 | Rob McMullen | Apple II support in Omnivore | 3rd | Web | GitHub |
| 2016 | Paul Hagstrom | Wavy Dots | n/a | DSK | GitHub |
| 2017 | Martin Haye | Apple III Satan Mode | DSK | ||
| 2017 | Ivan Hogan | Crossline | DSK TXT (source+directions) | TXT (version 2) TXT (version 3) |
|
| 2017 | Jeremy Rand | ColourGo | DSK (improved v1.5) DSK (HackFest entry) | GitHub | |
| 2017 | Russ Ross | 2048 | |||
| 2017 | Rob McMullen | Fujirun | 1st | DSK | GitHub |
| 2017 | Alain Zanchetta | Sargon II hack | 3rd | ||
| 2017 | Charles Mangin | You are a Grue | 2nd | ||
| 2017 | Alex French | Super Hi-Res Particles | |||
| 2017 | Kevin Savetz | Simon Sez | BAS DSK | ||
| 2019 | Adrian Bedard | 8 Bit Man | 1st | Website | |
| 2019 | Charles Mangin | Octopede | 2nd | DSK | GitHub |
| 2019 | Matthew Rand | Hot Dice | 3rd | DSK | GitHub |
| 2019 | Sarah W | Coveted Mirror Name Generator | 4th | DSK | Website Archive.org |
| 2019 | Mike Goodell | Keyboard Tester | |||
| 2019 | Alain Zanchetta | SCART Video Modes | |||
| 2019 | Kris Kennaway | Hires Shades of Gray | |||
| 2019 | Forrest Lowe | 6502 multiply/divide routines | |||
| 2019 | Margaret Anderson | Eamon Mapper | DSK | ||
| 2020 | Matt Rand | Using an Apple ][ through Discord | 1st | GitHub | |
| 2020 | Charles Mangin | Canyon | 2nd | DSK | |
| 2020 | Sellam Abraham | Mesmerizer Exorciser | 3rd | YouTube | |
| 2020 | Micah Cowan | Fnord | 4th | DSK | YouTube |
| 2020 | Ben Smith | Etch | 5th | DSK | YouTube |
| 2020 | Matteo Trevisan | VISUAL APPLE II OS | DSK | YouTube | |
| 2020 | Scott Lawrence | Video Switcher for the Apple ][c "Rollercoaster" LaserDisc Game | YouTube | ||
| 2020 | Andrew Roughan | Patch Mockingboard speech titles to use SAM software speech | GitHub |
Here are the rules for the HackFest competition:
- Contest begins at 7:00 AM CDT on the Wednesday of KansasFest and ends at 10:00 AM CDT that Saturday, so that judging can begin. The winners will be announced during the Saturday sessions. Entries submitted late won’t be considered. Entries may be done by individuals or teams; however, individual achievement counts.
- Three judges will be selected by the KansasFest committee to judge the competition; at least one of them will be available at all times, to provide assistance and judgment calls. At least one judge will be a non-programmer.
- Entries must be written entirely during the allotted time; no source code — printed or on any form of computer-readable media — may be used (although sample source code printed inside standard and acceptable reference materials is allowed), and the program must run on an Apple 1 (or clone) or Apple II model (or clone or emulator) or Apple /// (or emulator) present at KansasFest. The program may not require special features available only on a clone or emulator. It must be able to work on real Apple hardware.
- Any version of any development environment and programming language may be used; however, there may not be any libraries, header files, or macro sets used that aren’t standard-issue for that version of the development environment or programming language.
- Programs can’t require unusual additional software or hardware; it’s up to the judges to decide what constitutes “unusual”. The participant should ask in advance. The following lists are not necessarily complete lists of everything allowed; these are to be taken as “givens”. If it’s not on the list, please ask for confirmation.
Acceptable software:
- System software
- Development environment (no customizations)
- GSBug
- Nifty List
- Marinetti
- Exerciser
- ORCA/Debugger, Splat!
- DesignMaster, Foundation, Genesys, ResLin
- Talking Tools
- Spectrum, ProTERM, ANSITerm
Acceptable hardware:
- Apple II computer, monitor, disk drives, hard drives
- Apple 1 computer or clone
- Apple /// computer
- CD-ROM drive, tape drive
- Hard disk controller card
- Sound card (speakers/headphones/etc)
- Accelerator card (any speed)
- RAM card
- Accepted reference material:
- All official Apple reference materials (including manuals, technical notes, and file type notes)
- Reference manuals included with development tools and software
- Publically or commercially available reference manuals
Any other hardware, software, or reference material needs the approval of the judges in advance. When in doubt, ask the judges.
- Programs can’t take unfair advantage of system add-ons written in advance for the sole purpose of easing the work to be done during the contest period. Any extensions or other system add-ons used by an entry must have been released to the general public at least three months prior to the contest date. The exception is if a program, tool, or other utility is released during or within three months of KansasFest, it may be used by anyone not involved in its development (examples: Mike Westerfield with GSoft BASIC at KansasFest 1998; Ivan Drucker with Slammer at KansasFest 2010).
- Entries will be judged on completeness, cleverness, and the somewhat vague “cool” factor. Entries don’t have to be useful if they’re otherwise impressive, and they don’t have to be “finished.”
- All entry programs are the property of the creator, and do not have to be released to the general public at any time; however, we hope that entries will be distributed by some means (whether for free or otherwise) when ready. However, entries may be described or discussed, including screen shots (where applicable), by the KansasFest committee for promotional purposes, or by legitimate Apple II community press.