I was writing a problem, which is interactive, on polygon. There was a checkbox, which said interactive, so I thought I can use the problem on a Codeforces round. Then, I realized interactive problems can be on only gym contests, which is really sad news for me right now because I was really enthusiastic about this problem until just now.
What's the rationale for it? Are there any plans on changing this rule?
And which other platforms that support interactive problems are there that I can submit my problem?
I don't know if this is the reason, but doing hacks would be difficult.
I can think of 2 ways it could be implemented. Either participant manually interacts with program, or writes a program to do it. Both would probably require adding new features to CF sandbox.
There is also an option of not having hacks for interactive problems, but that seems like too big deviation from usual format for rated rounds.
I think that two ways you mention are really good and can be used together (similar to the current system for non-interactive problems). I'm not sure about the complexity of implementation though (especially manually interacting, automated interactor stuff is something already implemented I think).
Interactive problems can be designed so that they would be hackable right now, without any infrastructure changes. Take the problem from the tutorial: you have to guess the integer in 50 queries. How it works? The input file contains this integer, interactor reads it, and the solution send and receive messages to and from the interactor. In usual problems, the hack is the input file, and what's the difference here? It's the same, the hack is still the input file. Just describe the input format in the statement.
Probably the actual reason why they prohibit it is that most of greys can't into interactive problems. If so, why don't allow them in Div 1 only?
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