Disclaimer
These rules are similar to the official ACM ICPC Rules but are not
exactly the same.
Team Composition and Eligibility
A novice team consists of three (or fewer) students all of whom have not yet begun the
equivalent of CS3 (their third computer science course). This team will play on the novice problem set.
An expert team consists of three (or fewer) students. This team will play on the expert problem set.
All of the students on a team must be full-time undergraduates unless they have gotten prior permission (which won't be given to CS grad students).
Students who have won an ACM World Final competition are
ineligible to win this competition, although they are welcome to participate.
Accounts
All teams will be given a loaner Linux account and password as needed.
The Contest
Each team has access to one provided computer work station, and
is given (on paper
or a website) a set of
independent problems which may be solved in any order. Each solution is
a program, composed by the team at the work station, in
one of a set of available languages.
Teams may bring books, notes, or papers for reference, but may not use
the internet or their own files except as specified by the contest.
Teams may use their own laptops and thus up to one machine per person as they like.
Team members may communicate
with each other and with contest officials but not with anyone else.
Contest officials will assist teams with system problems.
When the team feels that it has solved a problem, the solution is submitted for judging.
It is judged by compiling it and running it against blind test data. If
it produces correct output for all test data, it is judged correct. If
it produces incorrect output it is judged incorrect. If it fails, either
to compile, or to run without error, it is judged incorrect. The judgement
is communicated to the team in as timely a manner as possible, and the
team may re-submit solutions judged incorrect. Re-submissions
for problems already judged correct are ignored.
The contest runs for three hours and consists
of six or more problems. When possible, current scores are available inside the contest software. Teams win one mini-prize for each problem they solve correctly. They must visibly wear these prizes no matter how unwearable they are. (Hint: Look around the room to see what problems everyone else has solved.)
The score is based on three components:
- the number of problems correctly solved
- the time from the beginning of the contest to the submission of
a correct solution for each problem
- the number of incorrect submissions to a problem for
which a correct solution is eventually submitted
First, teams are ranked in order of the number of correct solutions. When two
or more teams have the same number of correct solutions, they are further
ranked by penalty minutes computed as the sum of:
- for each solved problem, the number of minutes from the beginning of the
contest until the correct solution was submitted
- for each solved problem, 20 minutes for each incorrect solution submitted
before the correct solution
Example Scoring
Consider three teams, Red, Green, and Blue. The contest
starts at 1:00 and the submissions are as follows:
- Red submits a correct solution to Problem A at 2:15.
- Green submits a correct solution to Problem B at 3:00.
- Red submits an incorrect solution to Problem H at 3:01.
- Green submits a correct solution to Problem A at 3:50.
- Red submits a correct solution to Problem H at 4:00.
- Green submits an incorrect colution to Problem A at 4:00.
- Red submits an incorrect solution to Problem G at 4:15.
- Blue submits a correct solution to Problem C at 5:00.
The scores are as follows:
- 1st place: Red with 2 correct, 275 penalty minutes
- 2nd place: Green with 2 correct, 290 penalty minutes
- 3rd place: Blue with 1 correct, 240 penalty minutes
The Questions
The problems draw from high school and college mathematics and
computing, as well as everyday knowledge and problem solving.
Sample questions are available at
http://icpc.baylor.edu/compete/preparation.