Difference between revisions of "BAPC/Preliminaries"

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(Judge system)
(Miscellaneous tips)
 
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== Miscellaneous tips ==
 
== Miscellaneous tips ==
*Balloons!
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*It is a tradition to hand out coloured balloons for every completed exercise.
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*All participants for the BAPC have to be registered in the [https://icpc.baylor.edu/ ICPC] system. This registration should be done by the preliminary organisers, so make sure you have access to the system in advance. Additionally, it is recommended to already register all preliminary participants in this system, as this can result in more seats at NWERC. If your preliminary round is not registered in the system, you can contact the BAPC committee.
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*Helium balloons are even more awesome.
  
 
[[Category:BAPC]]
 
[[Category:BAPC]]

Latest revision as of 15:46, 6 March 2013

To choose the participants of the Benelux Algorithm Programming Contest, a university can choose to organise a preliminary round, to make a selection of all registered participants. This page will describe what steps are involved in setting up a preliminary round.

Planning

To make sure you are well prepared for the preliminary programming contest, it is important to start early. The preliminary rounds are usually scheduled around the start of October, so it is usually a good idea to start making preparations right after the summer break. A brief example of a planning is as follows:

  • Four weeks in advance: start preparations;
  • Two weeks in advance: location is arranged;
  • One week in advance: judge systems ready.

The programming assignments for the preliminary are sent by the jury and will arrive roughly one or two weeks before the contest itself to allow for enough time to prepare the judge system. Make sure the assignments are already present in the system a few days in advance, so problems with the judge systems can be discovered in an early stage, allowing for more time to solve them.


The most important things that should be prepared are the location and the judge system. Both are described in detail below.

Location

The most important thing that should not be taken lightly when organising a preliminary round. The location should have enough space to house all participants. As every team can consist of at most three people, there should be enough space at every workstation to give room to all team members. Usually one or several regular computer rooms should be sufficient for a preliminary round.

It is important to note that the location should be arranged as soon as possible, as it should be conformed with the local facility management to make sure the participants can gain entrance to the building (as the preliminaries take place on Saturdays) and the facility management is aware of people using the building. Organisers are encouraged to start deliberating with the facility management as soon as possible to prevent any problems. Allowing the facility management more time to take your request into consideration will greatly increase the chance on finding a suitable location.

Workstations

Every team should have its own computer to work on the exercises. One should make sure that every computer has all required software installed. Usually this is already the case as the students use the same tools during their regular practicals. However, if the workstations at the location don't have the required software installed, this should be detected early enough to resolve this. Usually this has to be done in deliberation with the system administrator. For more information about the required software, check out the tech page.

Judge system

An essential part of a programming contest is of course a system that checks the exercises. Information on how to set up a judge system you can look at the tech page. Make sure to start in time with this (at least two to three weeks in advance) to prevail the situation. If any problems are encountered or a server can't be facilitated, this should be determined in an early stage. The BAPC committee can then be contacted for support and sometimes the committee can open up their own server for use by the participants of the local preliminary. Note that if the BAPC committee is contacted on a short notice, they might not be able to help any longer.

Miscellaneous tips

  • It is a tradition to hand out coloured balloons for every completed exercise.
  • All participants for the BAPC have to be registered in the ICPC system. This registration should be done by the preliminary organisers, so make sure you have access to the system in advance. Additionally, it is recommended to already register all preliminary participants in this system, as this can result in more seats at NWERC. If your preliminary round is not registered in the system, you can contact the BAPC committee.
  • Helium balloons are even more awesome.