Enter the O’Reilly Architectural Katas challenge

What’s Architectural Katas?

Katas is a live online event where teams are given a real-world software architecture problem to solve. So your team members get the chance to flex their skills (and gain new ones) and see how the competition would approach the same problem.

This is a rare opportunity for your team to work together to practice its craft in a safe, social, interactive environment. Your team gets its ideas in front of software architecture superstars Neal Ford and Mark Richards—and everyone gets a chance to review and vote on the finalists’ solutions. Keep reading for the details or just go right to the schedule.

How it works

• Form a team consisting of one team lead or manager and up to four software architects (or developers looking to learn about architecture) from your company. You must all be from the same company.
• Up to 50 teams will be selected to participate in Architectural Katas, which will be held on the O’Reilly learning platform. Teams that are selected will be given free access to O’Reilly, both to participate in the challenge and to access learning resources from over 60,000 O’Reilly content assets they may need to come up with a winning solution.
• Your team will be assigned a facilitator who’ll get your team set up, answer questions about the event, and show you how to navigate the O’Reilly platform to access all the resources you may need to succeed.
• Over the course of 30 days (see schedule), you’ll exchange ideas, solve a software architecture problem, and, if you’re a finalist, present your plans before some of the best and brightest leaders in the industry.

What your team could win

Aside from solving a real-world architecture problem and gaining massive bragging rights, each team member from the winning team will receive:

• One free year of O’Reilly learning platform access
• A $100 Visa gift card
• A box of cool O’Reilly swag

Plus, the winning company will receive a limited-time 50% discount on any additional seats it wants to purchase for other employees of the same company.

Who is this challenge for?

• Senior developers and engineers, architects, technical product managers, and anyone in your organization who has at least three years of experience and makes decisions about architecture.
• Teams of up to five people can apply to participate, and at least one member of the team must be in a team lead or management position in your organization.
• Each team member must be from the same company. (Multiple teams from the same company can participate, but teams are limited to five people each.)
• Current O’Reilly platform members are not eligible for this Katas event. O’Reilly members can participate in an upcoming Katas challenge on the platform.