Software engineering isn’t always about who knows the most obscure tech stack, or who can create critical infrastructure without resorting to a google search. In fact, I believe that a mark of a good developer of any sort, is one who is adaptable, resilient, and open to learning and development. But how easy is it to develop this skillset if you are only ever working on iterating the same product every day?
In the Web team, we challenge ourselves to develop these skills consciously through two particular events per cycle. If you have ever wondered what the Web Team software engineers get up to outside of their usual Jira tasks, I’m about to break it down for you.
External Hack Week
Introduced to foster open-source community building, participating in an external hack week positions us as the open-source contributors. During this week, we scour repositories across Github, looking to snag some “good first issues” on different projects and applications spanning across industries such as healthcare, gaming, and even other open source systems.
The goal isn’t to make the biggest change within any given project, but to optimise and build within existing projects to learn more about the open-source landscape, aid others, and stick to Canonical’s purpose of valuing open source applications for the betterment of society.
Previous projects that the web team have contributed to include Mattermost, Scrabble, and educational resources that log and list different types of algorithms for computer science and data students to peruse.
Personally, I find it to be a nice break from the usual programming of the year, and it provides one with an opportunity to see what types of projects other organisations and individual enthusiasts are building in the current tech climate, as well as brush up on coding languages we use less often, and invest time in our own interests.
Internal Hack Week
Suggested as a way for developers to build product knowledge and contribute to internal maintenance, the internal hack week which ran for the first time in 2026, featured contributions and discussions on internal tools and issues.
Early design of the way hack week would take place proposed a number of benefits. For one, it would provide an opportunity for members of the team to try something new and work closely with colleagues they do not usually interface with. Additionally, If your role does not have much leadership then you could take the opportunity to run a project and consider acting in a different role, such as project management, design, technical authorship, testing or even backend via CI/CD and deployments. This year, I became a technical author, documenting alternative methodologies to create a more efficient testing environment for Juju development. I know little about Juju, but with the help of colleagues who worked with it every day, we were able to find an approach that would make their processes faster and more replicable. I’m happy I could help!
Some other particularly interesting initiatives laid out plans for Mattermost chatbots that assisted search functionality using AI, bots that send you direct mattermost messages whenever you are assigned a BAU task, and concept MVPs for generating and scanning QR codes during sprints. Practical, useful tooling that could increase productivity and efficiency within the organisation.
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In conclusion, these hack weeks have helped shape web team members as well rounded, and versatile developers. I can’t wait for the next! If you had a hack week initiative in your team, which would you prefer (internal or external) and what projects would you choose to work on?
I can’t wait to read your ideas!
