Overview
The WeatherGenerator will host its first Community Hackathon on 26–28 January 2027 in Jena, Germany. This in-person, hands-on event will bring together researchers and professionals working across Earth System sciences to explore the WeatherGenertor, exchange ideas and become part of its growing community. The goal is that each participating team can run and fine-tune the WeatherGenerator for its own application while learning from and contributing to the community around the open-source model.
Format
The hackathon will open with an introduction and a tutorial on the WeatherGenerator core model, its architecture, training approach and data formats. This is followed by short presentations in which each team introduces its application. The remainder of the event is dedicated to hands-on work on the applications, supported throughout by core model developers and by application scientists from across the project. The hackathon concludes with final presentations from all teams on the afternoon of the last day. A social programme will accompany the event.
The first day is expected to start at 09:00 CET on 26 January and end at 16:00 CET on 28 January.
Attendance
Registration opens on 1 September 2026 and will be moderated. Applications will be accepted on a rolling basis starting 1 October 2026, until capacity is reached. As places are limited, early submission is encouraged.
The event is open to teams of two to five people from research institutes, national meteorological and hydrological services, agencies, SMEs and industry, working on weather, climate, water, energy, agriculture, ecosystems or health. Teams from regions and application areas that are currently underrepresented in machine-learning-based Earth system modelling are particularly encouraged to apply.
Team requirements and preparation
Teams are expected to arrive with a well-defined target application — for example weather forecasting for a particular country, downscaling of a given variable over a defined region, or predicting an impact variable relevant to their sector. Data for the application should be prepared in advance if possible. Technical guidance on data formats will be shared with teams after acceptance. Familiarity with Python and machine learning is expected; though prior experience with foundation models and the WeatherGenerator is not.
Support and resources
The tutorial and training material, technical mentoring, access to pretrained checkpoints and the compute resources needed to fine-tune the WeatherGenerator during the event will all be provided by the project.
Costs and travel support
Participation is free of charge but travel and accommodation is self-funded. A limited number of travel grants may be available on a needs-based basis to support participants who could not otherwise attend; interest can be indicated in the registration form. Invitation letters for visa applications can be issued on request.
