📜 Official Rules

A project that does not meet the mandatory requirements in Submission Requirements is not scored. All times are Pakistan Standard Time (PKT).

1. Eligibility and teams

  • Open to enrolled undergraduates at NED University in Computer Science, Software Engineering, Computer Engineering, Information Technology and related programs.
  • Teams of 2 to 4 students. Every member registers on Devpost individually.
  • One pitch and one submission per team.
  • Only the top 15 teams from the pitch round take part in the build and are eligible for prizes. Every member of a shortlisted team is expected to attend the kickoff.

2. Originality and prior work

Ideas may be pre-existing. Product code may not.

  • Before 9:00 AM on 19 October, your repository may contain documentation only, such as your SPEC.md. You may also set up your environment: install tools, create accounts, provision a database or hosting. You may not write product code.
  • Your first commit containing product code must be timestamped after 9:00 AM on 19 October. No commits may be added after code freeze.
  • Commit throughout the event. A single large commit at the end is a red flag, and judges may ask you to walk them through your history.

Allowed with no declaration: open-source libraries and frameworks, public APIs and SDKs, Devmarketplace code gigs, official starter templates (such as create-next-app or Vite), and code generated by AI assistants during the event.

Must be declared: anything else that existed before kickoff, such as your own earlier project, a private library or a design system from previous work. Declare it in PRIOR_WORK.md and hand it in at the kickoff. Declared prior work is permitted, but judges score only what you built during the event. Declaring costs you nothing. Failing to declare is a disqualification.

3. Exemptions

The database (M2) and authentication (M3) requirements assume a multi-user application. If you are building something that genuinely is not one, such as a CLI tool, an editor extension, a hardware project or a data pipeline, hand in a written exemption request at the kickoff, before 1:00 PM on 19 October, saying why the requirement does not apply. Organisers decide on the spot. If there is nothing to deploy, replace the live URL with install and run instructions in your README.

Exemptions are not granted at judging time. M1, M4, M5 and M6 cannot be exempted.

4. Devmarketplace and code gigs

  • Every participant needs their own Devmarketplace account before the kickoff, not one per team.
  • Publish only code you wrote. Link to open-source components under their original licences instead.

5. Use of AI

  • AI coding assistants are allowed and expected. List the ones you used in AI_DISCLOSURE.md.
  • Keep your product's AI calls working until winners are announced. A feature that fails because a key was revoked or credits ran out fails M1.

6. Judging

Judges use your deployed app, watch your demo video and read your repository. Scoring starts only after the mandatory requirements are confirmed.

  • Working software and technical depth (30%): the product runs, with sensible architecture, a considered data model, error handling and readable code.
  • Problem and impact (20%): a real problem, a clear user, and a credible reason it matters.
  • AI integration quality (20%): is AI genuinely solving the problem? Thoughtful prompting, retrieval, tool use or handling of model failure scores far above one generic call.
  • User experience and interface (15%): a clean, coherent interface and a core journey that feels considered.
  • Demo and communication (15%): a clear, well-paced demo video that shows rather than tells.

Published code gigs are also reviewed. What separates the top teams: every scored project has AI, a database and authentication. That is the floor. Teams win on the depth of their AI integration and how complete the core experience feels.

7. Disqualification

The organising panel may disqualify a team for:

  • Undeclared prior code, including product code committed before 9:00 AM on 19 October.
  • Commits added after code freeze.
  • Plagiarised work, including publishing code you did not write as a code gig.
  • A repository that is private or inaccessible at judging time.
  • Misrepresenting how AI was used, for example presenting a hardcoded response as a live model call.
  • Breaching the event code of conduct or the university's student conduct policy.

Every one of these is avoidable by asking first.

8. Questions

Ask mentors at the kickoff and on Discord during the build. Ask early: a question on Monday costs you five minutes, while the same question on Thursday evening can cost you the project. Clarifications to these rules are posted as Devpost updates and on Discord.