Welcome to ODevs

GameDay is back this time with a Halloween themed Quest.

First 50 people to arrive will get a free drink ticket!

What is AWS GameDay? Think hackathon meets workshop. It's a hands-on, interactive, team-based experience where you solve real-world cloud challenges in a live AWS environment. You earn points, and the top 3 teams will win prizes. You and your team (2–4 people) will:

• Deploy and troubleshoot live AWS workloads
• Solve architecture and operational challenges
• Earn points on a real-time leaderboard
• Compete in a friendly but intense cloud showdown

This is a beginner-friendly event - even if you have never seen the AWS Console before, you have the chance to win. Strategy and problem-solving skills can trump AWS experience.

Who’s Involved? AWS and industry partners (more info coming soon) power this GameDay. The official AWS GameDay team will stand up and manage the entire environment, provision accounts, and guide the experience. Additionally, we’ll have local AWS employees supporting throughout the night.

What to Expect

• 2–3 hours of immersive, competitive cloud challenges
• Real AWS infrastructure (no simulations)
• Food & refreshments

Whether you're:

• A student exploring cloud,
• A developer looking to sharpen your skills,
• A DevOps engineer who thrives under pressure,
• Or a solutions architect ready to prove it...

This is for you.

What You Need Just bring your charged laptop. We’ll handle the rest. Teams can come pre-formed, or we’ll help match you up.

For years, designers have said they'd do better work if the organization got out of the way. AI is enabling us to test that claim. In his recent Smashing Magazine article, Andy Budd lays out two futures. In the bull case, designers can go from "we should fix this" to "I fixed this, and pushed it live," and need far less permission to act. In the bear case, that same autonomy exposes designers who were better at critique than at owning outcomes while product and engineering learn to route around design entirely.

Which future are you seeing at your company? Is your team gaining agency, or being narrowed to maintaining the design system? What does owning an outcome actually look like when anyone can prototype?

At this month's meetup, we'll dig into both sides and share what's happening in our respective organizations. All are welcome to attend! Whether you're working in UX, looking to get into the field, or just curious, please join us.

To get ready for the discussion, check out the article by Andy Budd: The Bull And Bear Case For Digital Design In The Age Of AI

Looking forward to the discussion!

〰️〰️〰️〰️〰️〰️〰️〰️〰️〰️〰️〰️〰️〰️〰️ 6:30 PM - Meet & Greet / Pre-networking (In-person only) 7:00 PM to 8:30 PM - Discussion group: Two Sides of Design Autonomy 8:30 PM - SUX "Social UX Meetup" for more socializing (In-person) 〰️〰️〰️〰️〰️〰️〰️〰️〰️〰️〰️〰️〰️〰️〰️ Photo by Marta Nogueira on Pexels

Join Orlando Devs for a Hacktoberfest 2026 meetup!

From Hacktoberfest

"Hacktoberfest has always been about empowering people to build open software together. For years, that energy was measured by pull requests and developers making their first open-source contributions. But open source was never defined by a PR counter. Open source is a philosophy centered on transparency and collective ownership. In an era where AI tools make low-effort PRs easier than ever to generate, maintainers face unprecedented volume and noise. This year, Hacktoberfest is focused on high-value, meaningful learning: giving everyone the tools and knowledge to experiment and build with open artificial intelligence. By joining Hacktoberfest, online or in-person, you can expect to learn about open-weight models, open source agents, and more. We believe open innovation must be prioritized alongside proprietary tools for an ecosystem to remain healthy and resilient. Instead of counting PRs, you’ll write your first skills.md, build your own open-source agent, fine-tune an open-weight model, or go wherever your curiosity takes you. Hacktoberfest 2026 is about meeting you wherever you are in your open source AI journey because we believe AI belongs to everyone."

https://hacktoberfest.com

This will be a session focused on skills and tools for open source contribution and a preview of the hackathon for the Central Florida Devfest https://devfestflorida.com where you can put those skills and tools to use!