About the Contest Problems

The problem set domain

Typically six to eight problems are attempted in a five hour period. The problems are of varying difficulty and flavor. We want two problems that could be solved in an hour by a first or second year student, two that could be solved in an hour by a third year student, and two that will likely determine the winners. Our goal is that every team solve two problems, that every problem is solved, and that no team solve them all.

Problems should be real-life problems. In the past we have had problems that searched for a missing boat at sea, triangulated the location of a faulty transmitter, computed golf handicaps, stacked pipe of varying diameters in a fixed width bin, coded or decoded messages, printed braille, sought an exit to a maze, processed satellite images, solved a math problem, and so on. Let the underlying algorithm be the problem, not the problem statement.

Problems should be presented with no more than a page of text, a helpful illustration, a sample input set with and accepted output set. Write the problem assuming that English is the second language of the reader. Any culture or discipline specific aspects should be thoroughly explained. If the explanation is more than a paragraph, think up another problem.

View past problems for examples. The World Finals problem sets of the recent past are excellent examples. One last note - no problem is too easy, easy problems are the most difficult to judge since their submissions come as a flood during the first hour of competition.

- Bill Poucher 13 Sep 97

Future types of problems

Director of Judging, Dick Rinewalt, and World Finals Chief Judge, Jo Perry, have been working on expanding the problem domain. Specifically, we want to include visual problems.

Experimentation is through the IBM VisualAge for Java Challenge, a fun competition held for the finalists before the World Finals. These problems will be posted and discussed in the near future.

- Bill Poucher 10 Nov 99

Future languages

What is happening with languages?  C++ and Java are becoming the dominant languages in the computing sciences.   Some regional contests no longer support Pascal.  Check About the World Finals for developments.