mostafa.saad.fci's blog

Releasing my private problems lists for ICPC/IOI/Online training
By mostafa.saad.fci, 5 years ago, In English

Updating from time to time to reach more guys..

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Since 2019 and I receive very positive feedback about the quality of my problem selections in my international supervision. I intended to make my problem lists public one day to help trainees to train in a more efficient and effective way.

This program started in 2016 and has been changed and improved a lot based on the received feedback from my trainees. I ended up with 2 big lists of problems: one for guys training toward IOI and another for ICPC/OnlineContest styles. Specifically 4 critical features:

  • Problem difficulty level [1-10] per problem is a manual weighted average of the assigned levels from my trainees’ sheets. A common complaint about 'online tools/ways for ranking problems by difficulty' is that they are not accurate. The issue is more severe for OI problems.

  • Problem importance level: ~ 5 levels (important, very interesting, interesting, good, normal/boring/repeated). Trainees solve a lot of problems that many of them are repeated or boring ideas. To maximize the training outcomes, one should train on unique/interesting ideas much more. Something that most of us can’t figure out easily.

  • Editorials. Many interesting problems may not have editorials (or have hard to understand editorials). I used to ask trainees to write some summary of how they solved a problem. Circulating these editorials between my trainees made it easy for them to get problems solved.

  • Submissions info: In Trainees Submissions page, ~25k submissions of my trainees. Per problem info (status, submissions count, times for reading/thinking/coding/debugging, category, subjective level, and a comment. You may use it to know some details about how others performed with the solved problem.

Links:

  • The problems lists link.
  • A Google Doc that outlines the evolution of this initiative since 2016. A lot of useful insights, especially for coaches.
  • Vote: I like it
  • +470
  • Vote: I do not like it

Comments Comments (34)
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5 years ago, # |
  Vote: I like it +35 Vote: I do not like it

Thank you so much for this!

I just have a small request: could you perhaps create another version of the IOI Level sheet with the category column hidden (to avoid spoilers)?

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    5 years ago, # ^ |
      Vote: I like it +14 Vote: I do not like it

    I thought guys can just fix a notepad file in the level column to hide it. so no need for more copies of the same sheet.

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5 years ago, # |
  Vote: I like it +11 Vote: I do not like it

A very fine collection of problems! Already solved a decent amount of them, can't not recommend!

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5 years ago, # |
  Vote: I like it +83 Vote: I do not like it

The export options are disabled. Can you enable them so that we can make a copy?

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    4 years ago, # ^ |
      Vote: I like it -14 Vote: I do not like it

    In this stage, It won't be downloadable. Sorry for the inconvenience.

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      4 years ago, # ^ |
        Vote: I like it +23 Vote: I do not like it

      Why not?

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

      How do you intend this list to be used? Currently there is no way to mark which problems are done and which aren't, unless you manually write down all problems you did and didn't solve (which is essentially making a manual copy of the list). It is a very big inconvenience.

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        4 years ago, # ^ |
          Vote: I like it +8 Vote: I do not like it

        I don't agree with your reasoning. I trained enough people in my life to different levels and most of them don't solve that much per year. It is little inconvenience that is all.

        I intend to make it downloadable once the list is stable. I will do several updates for it the real inconvenience will be for others to realize the updates in levels/links/additions.

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5 years ago, # |
  Vote: I like it +6 Vote: I do not like it

May I use this opportunity to ask how others are using the document to practice, I mean what strategies of practice to adopt. I myself am not able to devise good practice methods and eventually end up wasting lot of time.

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

Is this sheet suitable to be practised by specialist or expert range in cf?

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

Thank you so much for your efforts! The problems are indeed amazing and on point 90% of the time from my experience in the training.

Level wise, they were just outside my comfort zone but not too hard. And tricks wise, I remember learning a small new thing with almost every problem, they helped me a lot in my ICPC trainings. Especially when reading the official editorials.

Also the system of the supervisions helped a lot; since you tell us to submit our solutions on github and explain our approach in the cpp file, I always found helpful and diverse github solutions made by other trainees with nicely explained approaches to learn from. That was essential with UVa and ICPC Archive problems; which didn't have official solutions and any code on other github repos didn't have explained approaches with them.

Whatever your level is, I can't recommend this enough! It will save you tons of time and you'll see big improvements if you stick to it.

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

Can we download this file?

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

Can someone correlate the difficulty level(1-10) of problems in the sheet with codeforces difficulty(div2A-E/div1A-E)?

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

could you please enable coping columns from the sheet ?

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

seriously ? WilliamLin mentioned on your sheets is the @tmwilliamlin168 ?

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4 years ago, # |
  Vote: I like it +5 Vote: I do not like it

If the motto of release was to get us inspired or tell us how much effort others put in to reach top levels in CP , then it is good. But if you really want us to get benefit from this, kindly allow us to download it.

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4 years ago, # |
  Vote: I like it -29 Vote: I do not like it

Try becoming master before making "training" sheets for others.

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

    Lol, before talking shit about someone, try to know his background!

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      4 years ago, # ^ |
        Vote: I like it -25 Vote: I do not like it

      His "background" doesn't matter, if he can't get at least a master or something rating, he isn't a coach, although I get it,you can compile good OI questions and good quality questions from other websites, give to some people to solve it and act "coach".

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

        He left competing a long time before. Btw, he is the master of masters, i hope you get my point. Anyway, i don't want to play a comment-comment game with you. So, Peace!!

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          4 years ago, # ^ |
          ← Rev. 2   Vote: I like it -13 Vote: I do not like it

          "Masters of Master" No he isn't. Also, you poked first, if you don't want to "play comment-comment game", then remember not to put your BS to anyone who isn't even writing it for you.Peace!!

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

            Omg quality person.

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        4 years ago, # ^ |
        ← Rev. 2   Vote: I like it +17 Vote: I do not like it

        Looks like you have a problem with the word "coach". Let me rephrase it a little bit: supervisor. He supervises GM+ coders. By analyzing their submission statistics, he tries to find their weaknesses and assign appropriate problems to them. He gathers and analyzes data and identifies best problems for improvement. He doesn't teach them problem-solving (which I believe, doesn't need to be "taught"). One doesn't need to be master in CF to do any of these. He/she just needs to have time and willingness to volunteer. He has both, which is quite praiseworthy.

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4 years ago, # |
← Rev. 3   Vote: I like it 0 Vote: I do not like it

[deleted]

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

Some problems' 'importance' cell is empty. Are those problems less important?

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

I have almost finished the C1 page of your Junior Training Sheet. Can I start this sheet already?

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

Link is not working. Is this true? Or this is happening only with me.

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