ThousandEyes Hack Day is back! And the Innovation League did not disappoint this year in a spectacular show of projects and demos with more promise than ever to change how we live, work, and play. In addition to the ThousandEyes team members that participated, we opened the competition to our Cisco colleagues at AppDynamics, Meraki, and Umbrella.
"This was the best Hack Day we have had—just looking at all of these sessions makes me jealous that I could not participate," said Mohit Lad, Cisco GM/CEO & Co-Founder, ThousandEyes. "There was so much goodness that I wish we had 48 hours in a day to push all of this into our product as soon as possible."
In a compelling display of camaraderie and community, forty-seven teams from all over the globe worked diligently to present their ideas, ranging from generative AI-supported networking bots to IoT assurance to multi-cloud security to Internet sustainability. That said, the range of products showcased on Hack Day was not restricted to engineering alone. Presenters showcased a plethora of cutting-edge solutions to optimize sales processes, facilitate advanced visualizations, and efficiently manage and control expenses related to public cloud services.
Experience Like No Other
Unlike recent Hack Days that were predominantly virtual, 2023's Hack Day events had a distinctly hybrid feel with in-person social events and watch parties at our offices in Austin, Lisbon, London, Netanya, and (where it all began) San Francisco.
Our motto for Hack Day is to unleash your creativity. The only requirement we place on participants is that they create something that benefits the company, our customers, our team, or the world.
Some Hack Day projects don't require the use of computers. In one instance, a team created a wooden bench to place outside of a frequently used meeting room. It was impressive that they were able to conceive the idea and construct it using logs of wood, and then put it to good use.
And The Winners Are
Hack Day wouldn't be complete without awards. They're great for celebrating excellence and encouraging just the right amount of healthy competition. There's the People's Choice Award, which is always super popular, and decided on with a vote. And for the others, ThousandEyes Superstaff uses a comprehensive framework to evaluate projects in ways that recognize diverse aspects, functions, and strengths.
ThousandEyes and Cisco value teamwork across departments and recognize it for Hack Day projects through the Cross Collaborative Award. The Business Value Award acknowledges projects with the potential to become successful products or solve important customer problems. The Community Impact Award highlights projects that positively impact people, society, or the planet. Lastly, the Superstaff Choice Award is a special recognition from the ThousandEyes Executive Team, who select their favorite project based on innovation, impact, and execution.
ChatWithThousandEyes discovered an AI-powered solution to enhance the experiences of developers and customer engineers.
The Energy Insights team found a way to evaluate and enhance their energy consumption and carbon footprint via network path selection.
The Flow Garden Can team demonstrated how to monitor the traffic flow profile of every device across all customer networks.
Packet Sentinel's project assists in identifying the direction of packet loss.
ThousandVantage developed a network map navigation system.
IntelliTest discovered a method for detecting real-time server outages.
Team Techies presented improvements in Docs-as-Code.
ThousandPilot has developed a simple, one-click process for enrolling in any ThousandEyes preview program.
And, lastly, we were introduced to a customized OSS LLM and ChatGPT integration by Talk to Me Goose.