Mid Atlantic Regional ACM Programming Contest Sponsored By IBM

1. Mid Atlantic Regional ACM Programming ContestSponsored By IBM at Radford University November 5, 2011

2. Welcome • Welcome • Dr. Maung Htay, Regional Director • Dr. Orion Rogers, Dean of College of Science and Technology, Radford University • Mr. Eric Woods, IBM • Contest Rules by Dr. Hwajung Lee, Site Director

3. Rules • At most one contestant from each team may hold a baccalaureate degree. • No contestant may have completed two years of post-baccalaureate studies or hold a graduate degree. • Students who have competed in two World Finals may not compete in a Regional Contest.

4. Contestants are not required to be student members of the ACM in order to be eligible to compete in a regional contest. • Note, however, that all World Finals contestants are required to be student members of ACM • World Finals, May 14 ~ 18, 2012 – Warsaw, Poland

5. Each team competing in the Mid-Atlantic Regional Contest may make one substitution for a contestant who is unable to compete. • The team Coach or Faculty Advisor must notify the Contest Director of the substitution as soon as possible, but no later than at team check-in. The resulting team must be properly constituted.

6. Contestants may bring resource materials such as books, manuals and program listings. • Contestants may not bring any machine-readable versions of software or data.

7. Contestants may not use their own computers, computer terminals, keyboards, orprogrammable calculators. • Contestants may not use any kind of communication device such as radio sets, cellular phones or pagers.

8. Solutions to problems submitted for judging are called runs. • Each run is judged as accepted or rejected by a Contest Judge, and the team is notified of the result.

9. Rejected runs will be marked as one of the following: • syntax error • run-time error • time-limit exceeded (30 second program running time) • incorrect output • incomplete output • incorrect output format • If more than one of these applies, the judge can choose any of the applicable responses.

10. Notification of final accepted runs may occur after the end of the contest to keep the final results secret. • A general announcement to that effect will be made during the contest. • Notification of rejected runs will continue until the end of the contest.

11. A contestant may submit a claim of ambiguity or error in a problem statement by submitting a clarification request to the Contest Judges. Coaches may NOT submit such a claim and should not, for any reason, communicate with judges during the contest. • Read the problem carefully before requesting a clarification. Also, check to see if clarifications for that problem have already occurred. • If the Judges believe that the problem statement is sufficiently clear, you will receive the response “The problem statement is sufficient; no clarification is necessary”. Read problem statement carefully again and again.

12. If you still feel there is an ambiguity, you will have to be more specific or descriptive of the ambiguity you have found. • If the problem statement is ambiguous in specifying the correct output for a particular input, please include that input data in the clarification request. • You may not submit clarification request asking for correct output for inputs you provide.

13. If the Judges agree that an ambiguity or an error exists, a clarification will be issued to all contestants by the Head Judge. • Contestants are not to converse with anyone except members of their team and personnel designated by the Regional Contest Director.

14. Systems support staff may advise contestants on system-related problems such as explaining system error messages. Support staff will not answer questions pertaining to contest problems, compilers, editors, etc. • Any conversation between contestants on different teams (whether they are from the same or different universities) or with the Faculty Advisor or the team Coach is strictly forbidden.

15. The contest will be held in a networked environment. • The network may only be used to submit problems and to produce a listing in ways designated by the Head Judge and system support staff.

16. Remote login, ftp, telnet, mail or other networking activities within the contest environment or with machines outside this environment are strictly forbidden. • Any contestant who discovers a security leak must report this leak immediately to a system support staff member.

17. While the contest is scheduled to last exactly five hours, the Regional Contest Director has the authority to lengthen the contest in the event of unforeseen difficulties. • Should the contest duration be altered, every attempt will be made to notify contestants in a timely and uniform manner.

18. A team may be disqualified by the Regional Contest Director for any activity that jeopardizes the Contest, such as dislodging extension cords, unauthorized modification of contest material (software or hardware), forbidden network activity, or destructive behavior. The disqualification may occur immediately upon detection or up to 72 hours after the end of the Contest.

19. At least six problems will be posed. As far as possible, problems will avoid dependence on detailed knowledge of a particular applications area or a particular contest language. • The Regional Contest Director is solely responsible for ruling on unforeseen situations and interpreting these rules for the Regional Contest.

20. The problem set will be available for coaches and others one hour after contest begins.  Coaches or unauthorized persons are NOT supposed to contact to head judge or any judges during the contest time. If they do so, there may be a serious penalty to their teams.

21. SCORING THE CONTEST • The Regional Contest Judges are solely responsible for determining the correctness of submitted runs. • In consultation with the Judges, the Regional Contest Head Judge is responsible for determining the winners of the Regional Contest.

22. The judging staff is empowered to adjust for or adjudicate unforeseen events and conditions. • Their decisions are final and may not be appealed.

23. Teams are ranked according to the most problems solved. • For the purposes of awards, or in determining qualifier(s) for the Contest Finals, teams who solve the same number of problems are ranked by least total time.

24. The total time is the sum of the time consumed for each problem solved. • The time consumed for a solved problem is the time elapsed from the beginning of the contest to the submittal of the accepted run plus 20 penalty minutes for every rejected run for the problem, regardless of submittal time. • There is no time consumed for any problem that is not solved.

25. It is the responsibility of the Regional Contest Director to specify any tie-breakers if necessary.

26. Contact Persons • Dr. Maung Htay, Regional Director • Dr. Hwajung Lee, Site Director • Dr. Hui Wang, Local Judge • Dr. Andrew Ray, Regional System Administrator • Ms. Kathy Anderson, Mr. Sean Drummond, and Mr. Michael Thola, Systems Administrator

27. Please Join me to thank you to those who make this event happen • IBM (represented today by Mr. Eric Woods) for sponsoring this event • Regional Director, Dr. Maung Htay • Dean Orion Rogers and department chair Dr. Art Carter for their strong support and encouragement • Dr. Andrew Ray for serving as Regional System Administrator, and also our panel of distinguished regional judges. • Ms. Kathy Anderson, Mr. Sean Drummond, and Mr. Mike Thola for systems management • ACM local chapter volunteers, Stephanie Reese, Alex Meade, Mike Thola, Andrew Melton, Billy Coss, Travis Smith, Gregory Hagen, Jason Langdon, Victoria Sanker, Andrew Pierce

28. Schedule to Go 8:00 – 8:45 Registration & Breakfast (McGuffey Hall 206) 8:45 – 9:30 Welcome Session (McGuffey Hall 206) 9:30 – 10:30 Practice Session (Davis 114 and 225 Labs) 11:00 – 12:00 Lunch (McGuffey Hall 206) 12:00 – 5:00 Contest (Davis 114 & 225) 5:00 - 6:00 pm Dinner & Awarding Ceremony (McGuffey Hall 206)

29. PC Lab (Room 114)

30. UNIX Lab (Room 225)

31. Good Luck 