Nickolas's blog

April Fools Day Contest

By Nickolas, 13 years ago, translation, In English

Editorial

You might have already noticed the next contest in the events calendar, the one named April Fools Day Contest. The name hints that the contest is unusual, nowhere near serious and maybe even snide. One could even guess the author of the contest — the meanest of all out there, that would be me :-)

I love unusual contests — Surprise/Unknown Language which require solutions in unusual languages, Time Limit Exceeded which require solutions in C but written in an unusual manner... Most of such contests exploit the domain of unusual solutions. I've decided to take a peek at the dual domain — unusual problem statements.

In this round you'll be given several weird problems and 2 hours to solve them. The contest will be unrated (you bet!), and it will follow ACM ICPC rules (no hacks, the standings are decided by the number of solved problems and penalty time earned on them). You can submit solutions in any language allowed by Codeforces — of course, unless the problem says otherwise :-)

Be warned, to enjoy competing in this round you'll need a sense of humor compatible with mine! It's April Fools Day, after all. Enjoy!

P.S. This contest exists solely due to maksay who volunteered to do all technical preparations. Thanks!

Announcement of April Fools Day Contest
  • Vote: I like it
  • +140
  • Vote: I do not like it

»
13 years ago, # |
← Rev. 3   Vote: I like it 0 Vote: I do not like it

Awesome !

Thanks.

Good luck everyone. ;)

→ Reply
»
13 years ago, # |
  Vote: I like it +1 Vote: I do not like it

Good luck everyone~

→ Reply
»
13 years ago, # |
  Vote: I like it 0 Vote: I do not like it

I registered for the contest and was surprised to see 'Enter' button immediately. I was able to see problems A, B and after that it gave error. Seems its corrected now.

→ Reply
  • »
    »
    13 years ago, # ^ |
    ← Rev. 2   Vote: I like it -11 Vote: I do not like it

    I am sorry to say..but may be you have been fooled ..After all its the April Fool Day contest :)

    → Reply
»
13 years ago, # |
  Vote: I like it +76 Vote: I do not like it

Here are the tasks -> http://bit.ly/H66EsD

→ Reply
»
13 years ago, # |
  Vote: I like it +2 Vote: I do not like it

So many people want to see tasks before contest begins :)

→ Reply
  • »
    »
    13 years ago, # ^ |
      Vote: I like it +6 Vote: I do not like it

    I clicked just to be sure it is rickroll.

    → Reply
  • »
    »
    13 years ago, # ^ |
      Vote: I like it +25 Vote: I do not like it

    Yeah, I just checked the click counter, 124 people opened the link. :)

    → Reply
»
13 years ago, # |
  Vote: I like it -11 Vote: I do not like it

You make me curious :D

→ Reply
»
13 years ago, # |
  Vote: I like it +21 Vote: I do not like it

very veRY VERY FUN CONTEST :)

→ Reply
»
13 years ago, # |
  Vote: I like it -6 Vote: I do not like it

I love this contest. but when I arrived the contest is almostly finished. :(

→ Reply
»
13 years ago, # |
← Rev. 2   Vote: I like it +13 Vote: I do not like it

Thanks for the contest,it was great fun. I am keen to know what was the secret language and how you figured it out? reading problem C i though it could be chef but it didn't work.

Also how you solve D without brute force submitting?

→ Reply
  • »
    »
    13 years ago, # ^ |
      Vote: I like it 0 Vote: I do not like it

    Binary search submitting?

    → Reply
    • »
      »
      »
      13 years ago, # ^ |
      ← Rev. 2   Vote: I like it +5 Vote: I do not like it

      Try to compile something, google the error message. EDIT: I didn't figure this out during the contest :P

      → Reply
      • »
        »
        »
        »
        13 years ago, # ^ |
          Vote: I like it +8 Vote: I do not like it

        Thats amazing!! I thought codeforces placed this error massage so that we cant find what the language is seeing the error. Double thanks to problemsetter,that was a great idea!!

        → Reply
        • »
          »
          »
          »
          »
          13 years ago, # ^ |
            Vote: I like it 0 Vote: I do not like it

          That's exactly what I thought, so I didn't bother searching it. It was clever.

          → Reply
  • »
    »
    13 years ago, # ^ |
    ← Rev. 2   Vote: I like it -6 Vote: I do not like it

    Basically, for E, you have to put INTERCAL into binary, and then you can copy hello world programs off google and change the values. EDIT: sorry, you wrote E For D, you can just randomly submit stuff

    → Reply
  • »
    »
    13 years ago, # ^ |
      Vote: I like it +5 Vote: I do not like it

    As for the figuring out part, just send anything. The compiler output from the compilation error will tell you what language it is.

    → Reply
  • »
    »
    13 years ago, # ^ |
    ← Rev. 3   Vote: I like it +11 Vote: I do not like it

    I've just tried a greedy algorithm to determine a "good" strategy to solve D. My result (based on 3^5 cases) is 11 submissions in worst case (but only 1 case) while average 5-7 submissions in about 60% cases.

    → Reply
»
13 years ago, # |
  Vote: I like it -13 Vote: I do not like it

Horrible contest! And the author is really mean>_<

→ Reply
»
13 years ago, # |
← Rev. 2   Vote: I like it 0 Vote: I do not like it

A few of exotic problems. However, I like them. Thanks, Nickolas.

→ Reply
»
13 years ago, # |
  Vote: I like it +9 Vote: I do not like it

This contest is very interesting.

In Problem E, we get very angry CE message: "DO YOU EXPECT ME TO FIGURE THIS OUT?", and it took me about half an hour to modify the "Hello world" into "INTERCAL".

In Problem H, it's much difficult than I think. I try to solve this by writing the code in Herbert (http://herbert.tealang.info/) then simulate it. But I can't solve it until the end of contest.

By the way, is there the editorial to this contest?

→ Reply
  • »
    »
    13 years ago, # ^ |
    ← Rev. 4   Vote: I like it 0 Vote: I do not like it

    I used divide & conquer but got WA4 too. I downloaded KADR's solution & run all possible test cases (to compare output) but still can't find mistake T_T

    Edit: It looks like the orientation of the polyline change when we change a... what an unexpected behaviour :(

    → Reply
  • »
    »
    13 years ago, # ^ |
      Vote: I like it +10 Vote: I do not like it

    It will be here, working on translation now.

    → Reply
    • »
      »
      »
      13 years ago, # ^ |
        Vote: I like it +5 Vote: I do not like it

      Thank you!

      Oh my god, now I know that the statement in Problem C is a programming language named Chef. I think people without knowing this language nearly can't solve this problem.

      → Reply
»
13 years ago, # |
  Vote: I like it +15 Vote: I do not like it

the best contest ever :) , thank you all

→ Reply
»
13 years ago, # |
  Vote: I like it +1 Vote: I do not like it

Very Nice Contest. I think it was something like IQ test. Thank you and looking forward for another one...

→ Reply
»
13 years ago, # |
  Vote: I like it 0 Vote: I do not like it

Really fun :D I love it :D

→ Reply
»
13 years ago, # |
  Vote: I like it -10 Vote: I do not like it

The real programming problem is only on problem H

→ Reply
  • »
    »
    13 years ago, # ^ |
      Vote: I like it +14 Vote: I do not like it

    the real programming problem is on the usual Codeforces Round :p

    → Reply
    • »
      »
      »
      13 years ago, # ^ |
        Vote: I like it +1 Vote: I do not like it

      The man who solve problem D in one shoot must be a problem maker for that problem :))

      → Reply
      • »
        »
        »
        »
        13 years ago, # ^ |
          Vote: I like it 0 Vote: I do not like it

        'a' in the only one-letter word in English, so it's easy

        → Reply
        • »
          »
          »
          »
          »
          13 years ago, # ^ |
            Vote: I like it 0 Vote: I do not like it

          what about 'I'? it's also a one-letter word

          → Reply
      • »
        »
        »
        »
        13 years ago, # ^ |
          Vote: I like it 0 Vote: I do not like it

        There are 3^5 possibilities. It means the probability of getting Accepted in only one submission is 1/243. It is still possible, since there are >800 participants :p

        → Reply
        • »
          »
          »
          »
          »
          13 years ago, # ^ |
          ← Rev. 2   Vote: I like it +9 Vote: I do not like it

          Actually, '+' doesn't mean only one submission. Submissions with WA on test 1 are not counted.

          → Reply
»
13 years ago, # |
  Vote: I like it +32 Vote: I do not like it

In problem D it is possible to guess the input number by inserting something like:

Sleep(N * 200); // Wait for 200 * N ms

And looking into running time during wrong attempts. That should decrease the number of attempts.

→ Reply
»
13 years ago, # |
  Vote: I like it 0 Vote: I do not like it

April fools contest, problem A-B-D-E-F

I liked this contest. It was very fun, and sort of practice for the strange part of ISPC.

→ Reply
»
13 years ago, # |
  Vote: I like it +28 Vote: I do not like it

Nice tasks

A. a1 + reverse(a2)

B. 1 + 6 * a * (a — 1)

C. sum(i=1 .. a_0) i * a_(a0 — i + 1)

D. if (input == 5) print 1 else print (input % 3) + 1

E. write "INTERCAL" in the language INTERCAL (use wikipedia to find 'Hello world' program and learn how to write strings using INTERCAL)

F. finding 'an', 'a', 'the', 'number', 'output' in the text deduce the code -> task: output n-th prime number pn which reverse is also prime (and different from pn)

G. repeat { a1, a2 <- a2, a1 + a2 } a3 times, output a1

→ Reply
»
13 years ago, # |
  Vote: I like it 0 Vote: I do not like it

rating?? April Fools Day Contest

→ Reply
»
13 years ago, # |
  Vote: I like it +16 Vote: I do not like it

still system testing 100%, no final results ;)

→ Reply
»
12 years ago, # |
  Vote: I like it +19 Vote: I do not like it

will there be something similar this year?

→ Reply
  • »
    »
    12 years ago, # ^ |
      Vote: I like it +53 Vote: I do not like it

    Yes, we've already added it to the schedule

    → Reply
    • »
      »
      »
      12 years ago, # ^ |
        Vote: I like it +7 Vote: I do not like it

      Maybe you should create a new post about April Fools Day Contest?

      → Reply