The All Siberian Programming Olympiad is one of the "preparatory" contests for ACM ICPC, as it has the same rules as the world championship. The Olympiad program is divided into two levels — the qualifying absentee round and the internal round when participants have to gather together to solve problems. The internal round includes two nominations.
According to the rules of the first one, participants have to create strategies to compete with each other. The game they play resembles agar.io — rounds of different sizes pursue each other. Those that are bigger "eat" small ones. The strategies presented by participants navigated rounds.
"This Olympiad dramatically differs from other contests thanks to its first round devoted to creating strategies. A result mostly depends on luck because there is no right solution, as one tries to understand what strategy is better to take into account each situation," shares Nikolay Budin.
The second nomination also correlates with АСМ ICPC. Participants solve 11 problems. The "SPb ITMO University" solved 8 tasks and thanks to a breakthrough in the first nomination managed to gain the first prize. As the students noted, usually those who succeeded in making strategy fail when they solve problems and vice versa.
The second team from ITMO consisted of Vladimir Smykalov, Ilya Zban and Ivan Beelonogov also took part in the contest. Their team called ITMO University 1 took 8th place.
"Participating in this Olympiad makes students grow as professionals — they can put their achievements into their CV," note organizers of the All Siberian Programming Olympiad.
