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Baklazan's blog

By Baklazan, history, 9 years ago, In English

Hello Codeforces,

I would like to propose a challenge to all this year's IOI contestants:

  1. Before the first day of contest pick some positive real constant C.

  2. During the IOI do C push-ups for each point you fail to score at the contest. Formally, if you score P points, you will have to do (600 - PC push-ups. You can do your push-ups during whole IOI and you are not forbidden to do more push-ups than you have to (which means that you can start doing your push-ups even before the first contest day).

This challenge is not completely new, several contestants have been doing it since IOI 2013, but as far as I know, it was never proposed publicly.

Feel free to share your chosen constant C and later also number of push-ups you have to do and your progress in comments.

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9 years ago, # |
  Vote: I like it 0 Vote: I do not like it

I would like to reach a level where I can choose any constant C without any fear :)

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    9 years ago, # ^ |
      Vote: I like it +31 Vote: I do not like it

    I think you can never do it without any fear. There is always a chance that there will be some random funny problem (like Artclass at IOI 2013) and you simply can't be prepared for all such problems. Also, it's physically impossible to do any number of push-ups, because you will eventually die and you cannot do them infinitely fast.

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      9 years ago, # ^ |
        Vote: I like it +44 Vote: I do not like it

      When I read na2a's comment, I thought he wanted to be strong enough to do any number of push-ups >_<

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    9 years ago, # ^ |
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    Start going to the gym)

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      9 years ago, # ^ |
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      Actually I meant that I would to like be strong enough to get 600/600 w/o any problem :D

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9 years ago, # |
Rev. 3   Vote: I like it +5 Vote: I do not like it

Sounds awesome, but I fear choosing anything above C=2 will just kill me :D

So C=2 for me :)

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    9 years ago, # ^ |
      Vote: I like it +37 Vote: I do not like it

    when seeing you in your avatar, thinking you can set C > 10 easily

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9 years ago, # |
  Vote: I like it +46 Vote: I do not like it

I think I have a better plan: every time you fail to score 100/100 with your submission you should stand up and do C push-ups right near your workplace(as far as I remember, it's ok to stand up and do some exercise in case you are tired of sitting).

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    9 years ago, # ^ |
      Vote: I like it +35 Vote: I do not like it

    I don't really like this idea, because it can negatively influence your contest performance.

    For instance, if you finish writing your solution just few minutes before the end of the contest and you still need to fix minor bugs, doing push-ups for each unsuccessful submit will make you lose very precious time.

    Also, sometimes it can be strategical to submit the same code multiple times, as only the best submission counts (for instance, when your runtime on the largest input is very close to time limit, so it sometimes gives you TLE and sometimes OK). Having to do push-ups after most of these submissions can discourage you from doing so.

    I think it's OK to do such things on contests where you only represent your self, but not on contests where you also represent your country.

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      9 years ago, # ^ |
      Rev. 3   Vote: I like it +23 Vote: I do not like it

      Yeah, but if you follow my plan and win IOI at the same time, then your victory will be ten times more cool :) You can do some workout after you got perfect score and have nothing to do till the end of the contest.

      If Scott was there, I bet he would take the challenge :)

      UPD
      I don't understand downvoting of Baklazan's comment. He has pointed some real drawbacks of following my suggestion. I remember myself having no guts to walk around my workplace at IOI, let alone speaking about push-ups.

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    9 years ago, # ^ |
    Rev. 2   Vote: I like it +7 Vote: I do not like it

    It would be fun to see all contestants doing push-ups during the contest. :D

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9 years ago, # |
Rev. 2   Vote: I like it 0 Vote: I do not like it

Sounds challenging. I choose C = 1. Hope next year I will be able to choose larger. :P

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9 years ago, # |
Rev. 4   Vote: I like it +89 Vote: I do not like it

0

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    9 years ago, # ^ |
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    WA: constant must be positive.

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      9 years ago, # ^ |
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      printf("%lf",0.0000000000001)

      Actually its not 0.

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        9 years ago, # ^ |
          Vote: I like it -19 Vote: I do not like it

        Hey, you didn't state the type, for all we know it could have been an exact base-2 number! :D (I've been thinking about 249C - Piglet's Birthday for too long)

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9 years ago, # |
  Vote: I like it +9 Vote: I do not like it

I accept , C=3

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    9 years ago, # ^ |
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    In worst case you will do 1800 push-ups.

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      9 years ago, # ^ |
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      Maybe he has worked out so much in the gym that he is confident enough to choose this high constant :)

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    9 years ago, # ^ |
      Vote: I like it +12 Vote: I do not like it

    (300 — 10) * 3 = 870 push-ups.

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9 years ago, # |
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Maybe regular challenge for every CF contest with c = 0.02?

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    9 years ago, # ^ |
    Rev. 2   Vote: I like it -7 Vote: I do not like it

    I'm fine with c = 0.1 and increasing it when it gets too low. Don't forget that the pushups can be spread over a long period of time. Over the last year, there've been something like 0.2 div1 rounds per day; if I tried all and solved nothing (which is far from reality), that makes just 150 per day. A more realistic estimate would be... 40 per day? 60? Not much.

    UPD: Number of downvotes: 7, number of replies: 0. If you think I'm wrong, why don't you tell me?

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      9 years ago, # ^ |
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      If you're that tough to do that number of pushups then better do it in a more organized way, to make it normal training, adjusting it according to how you did in a contest will make training chaotic :P. With smaller c I think we can still consider it rather as a fun :P.

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        9 years ago, # ^ |
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        Tough? I'm not (hence this — to change it), but come on, that much isn't even exhausting. It doesn't have to be at once, even — 60 per day is like 5 per hour + 12 hours sleeping time.

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    9 years ago, # ^ |
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    For regular CF contest you can do C*(your rank) push ups.

    e.g. If C = 1 and your rank is 100, you need to do 99 push up.

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9 years ago, # |
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    9 years ago, # ^ |
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    Pic doesn't load.

    UPD: resolved

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      9 years ago, # ^ |
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      Loads for me. Tried reloading bypassing cache and clean browser. Can you be more specific, please?

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        9 years ago, # ^ |
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        It loads now. (I tried opening the pic itself in a separate tab and the page kept loading for a long time, while everything else worked. Weird.)

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    9 years ago, # ^ |
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    C=1 for pull-ups, C=8 for push-ups?

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      9 years ago, # ^ |
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      Are you going to do 600 - P pull-ups and (600 - P)·8 push-ups?

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9 years ago, # |
  Vote: I like it +15 Vote: I do not like it

I pick C = 2.

I like how you specified that C must be positive and real. But shouldn't it be rational as well? I think it would be very hard to do push-ups.

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    9 years ago, # ^ |
      Vote: I like it +40 Vote: I do not like it

    "you are not forbidden to do more push-ups than you have to" resolves a problem

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    9 years ago, # ^ |
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    I prefer this. If you don't lose any rating, you don't do any.

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    9 years ago, # ^ |
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    I am even worse in push-ups than in problem solving. Anyway, who cares? — I'm in!

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      9 years ago, # ^ |
        Vote: I like it +3 Vote: I do not like it

      "I am even worse in push-ups than in problem solving." -- says grandmaster...

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        9 years ago, # ^ |
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        We need one more grandmaster to continue this recursion. :D

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        9 years ago, # ^ |
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        We are in IOI thread and my IOI results were more like Specialist's rather than Grandmaster's ones :)

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          9 years ago, # ^ |
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          Let's take a look what is the Specialist's result at first. :)

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          9 years ago, # ^ |
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          In which universe 2 times bronze is specialist's results? :P

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            9 years ago, # ^ |
              Vote: I like it +13 Vote: I do not like it

            Well, seems like 90% of IOIers with CF account get a medal.

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            9 years ago, # ^ |
              Vote: I like it -28 Vote: I do not like it

            Bronze medal = being in better half (given lots of guys who can't even write a simplest bruteforces)

            So wow, much achievement, such impressive

            Qualifying to IOI could be really hard in particular countries (e.g. China, Russia, Poland and few more), but given participation then lol. Isn't being at least blue sufficient condition to have a pretty big prob to get a bronze?

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              9 years ago, # ^ |
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              It is achievement for some people. And quite a lot of them know how to code.

              Just because something is easy for one person doesn't mean that he should belittle this for others. I didn't see tourist claiming that getting in top 10 is "so wow, much achievement, such impressive" despite it being easy for him.

              For a more illustrative example, let's replace skills/talent with money and medal with food. Now it'll be like saying to the poor family that getting some food is ridiculously easy. To some, it is. To some it is not. I hope you're not comfortable with doing that. But then why do so with respect to competitive programming? </quick_esca lation>

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                9 years ago, # ^ |
                  Vote: I like it +19 Vote: I do not like it

                I see this same discussion practically every month on Codeforces forums, but almost never in any other competitive sport. If you don't know why this is the case, try teaching some beginners math and you'll figure it out quickly.

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                  9 years ago, # ^ |
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                  Considering as well that in sport one at least has an idea how legs and muscles work when they hit a projectile, but nobody has a clue how their mind is able to remember something or how their imagination can see right through a problem. Of course it seems easy if it "just happens".

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

Challenge Accepted ! C=1 :)

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9 years ago, # |
Rev. 6   Vote: I like it +18 Vote: I do not like it

I will, of course, accept this challenge as well. C = 8.

UPD: Progress: 1280/1276.4 -- I'm done!

I lost 54.55 points (436.4 push-ups) because I forgot to change return 0; to return -1; at one place (when changing a function that returned bool into a function returning int). Also, I probably lost 56 points (448 push-ups), or maybe even 79 points (632 push-ups), because I forgot to comment-out debugging output.

I think I will never forget these lessons and do these mistakes again :D.

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    9 years ago, # ^ |
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    Have fun ,call me i can help for counting

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    9 years ago, # ^ |
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    Write debug on cerr, so you won't get WA and have

    #ifndef LOCAL
    #define cerr if(0)cerr
    #endif
    

    so you won't get TLE :P. Captain Hack strikes again.

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9 years ago, # |
Rev. 2   Vote: I like it +11 Vote: I do not like it

Choosing C=2 and then failing day 1 (179 pts)... Well, here we go with the push-ups :D

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    9 years ago, # ^ |
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    Maybe we will make a "push-ups corner"? :D I scored 68.33 and C = 1.

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9 years ago, # |
  Vote: I like it +48 Vote: I do not like it

I wouldn't mind joining all of you for some push-ups after day 2 :)

Any idea how to extend this challenge to the jury? We certainly could do C * all the points you guys did score, but I'm afraid that in order to survive the challenge we would need a C pretty close to zero :)

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    9 years ago, # ^ |
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    I'd say for jury generally it should be something like C·clarifications.

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      9 years ago, # ^ |
        Vote: I like it +43 Vote: I do not like it

      That's a great idea. The number of push-ups I'll do is 25 times the number of public clarifications on problem statements, plus 5 times the number of clarifications sent just to a single contestant.

      Invalid questions and "no comment"s don't count! Don't swamp us with useless questions, pretty please! :)

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    9 years ago, # ^ |
      Vote: I like it +30 Vote: I do not like it

    For the record, I'm doing 1 pushup for each minute during which the grading queue is more than 5 minutes behind.

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9 years ago, # |
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Someone has codes for tasks A and C ?? if there is please publish