TheWorse's blog

By TheWorse, 4 hours ago, In English

I used AI to fix my grammar, so this blog might look like it was written by AI.

So, recently, I participated in a school contest that had pretests. I was quite sure that I was going to get a high rank; however, after the system tests, I was disappointed to discover that I had forgotten to define int long long (and forgot many other stuffs), which ruined the whole thing.

So, how can I get better at handling pretests? I'm not talking about Codeforces rounds, because on Codeforces, the pretests are equal the same as the system tests.

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4 hours ago, hide # |
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I'm facing the exact same issue too.

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4 hours ago, hide # |
 
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Get better at problem solving!

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3 hours ago, hide # |
 
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Just get better in problem solving in general

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3 hours ago, hide # |
 
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might you not mind sharing the contest link

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3 hours ago, hide # |
 
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One thing that I have noticed in general is, when the idea you are thinking has a very bad implementation, that might not be the intended solution, because most questions have intended solutions based on 1 or 2 ideas. If you feel your way of thinking is clean enough, that is when you implement the solution

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80 minutes ago, hide # |
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Learn to generate random tests and write code carefully and clearly (avoid overflow, MLE, RTE, corner cases). It’s less critical in online contests since you can resubmit, but in offline contests it’s essential if you’re starting CP. (I used AI to fix it because my English is bad)

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because on Codeforces, the pretests are equal the same as the system tests.

That is not true, they are usually same as pretest on Div. 2+ for problems A to D, but in Div. 3/4/Edu, people can spam simple TLE or edge-case hacks to gain a lot of successful hacks with little risk. So you should also be careful of Codeforces' contests too.