Claude Code Hackathon
Hacking away with Claude Code
Had a fantastic experience at my first hackathon of the year at Claude Code Portland this past weekend! In two and a half hours, I built CodeReel! A VS Code extension that uses Claude AI to generate animated, step-by-step explanations of how your code works, directly inside your editor without all the context switching.
Quick overview:
- Click ”▶ Explain with CodeReel” above any JavaScript or TypeScript function
- Claude analyzes the code and generates a structured animation: line highlights, variable state, plain-English annotations
- A split pane opens showing the code walkthrough on the left and your live running app updating in real time on the right
If you’re curious about the project, the code is live on GitHub: https://lnkd.in/gGXH-vQf
I came to the hackathon with a few different ideas in mind and ended up building a tool that enables engineers to quickly ramp up on a new codebase. Onboarding engineers that are new to a project is a process that takes time and this extension can quickly help bridge the gap between just reading code and actually understanding the codebase.
AI-assisted development has evolved significantly these past few months and much of the inspiration for this project was all about drastically shortening the feedback loop for engineers. Participating in events like this, I’ve seen firsthand how this speed allows us to turn rather ambitious concepts into reality in just hours rather than days.
It’s always fascinating how quickly the time flies by while building something that you’re excited about while picking up new skills along the way. Going from zero to a working, demo-ready product in a single hackathon session with Claude Code as my development environment was a ton of fun.
Whatever your background, I can’t recommend participating in a hackathon enough! Connecting with others in the community, building something exciting, and learning something new is always a great time. I was so impressed with what others built!
Big thanks to Joanna Gough and AJ Green for hosting the hackathon!
I’d love to connect with other engineers experimenting with various AI-driven workflows. What’s the most surprising or ambitious project you’ve shipped lately using these tools?