How to get the new ideas & When should I look at the editorial. (You can avoid spoilers, not a must read)
I tried hard to solve the Problem G
I've spent 30 minutes trying it, and I'm already out of ideas.
My fear
What I usually try to do is "I will try for another 15-20 minutes then I will try again tomorrow and I will look at the editorial."
Any slight hints/ideas or anything on how to face the situation that I'm facing these days would be greatly appreciated.
My Goal
Sorry
As a newbie, I would say spend more time solving harder problems, and if you still can't figure it out. Look at the solution. It will deepen your understanding.
What really helps is watching the livestreams of the contests.
Not all techniques have names. Many techniques are not listed anywhere. The only way to know them is from someone more experienced. If you don't have such people around you, livestreams are all you have. And they should be good enough.
Don't fall in the trap of automatically assuming that hard problems can only be solved with some algorithm or technique you don't know. Sure, there are many unnamed techniques, but you can often come up with them if you think hard enough. Look at the editorial only when you stop making progress and/or getting ideas.
That's the whole fucking point of problem solving, when u face questions like this is the time you learn, spend a year on a problem, what is wrong with it?
When You wanna solve the problem, it's not in the air and your mind, it's on paper with a pen, You think, you simulate the process, You get an Idea, try it, Oh it's incorrect, did I lose something now? NO. I just learnt a new idea, now if I see another question requiring this idea, I know it and don't have to spend another hour on it, When you solve problems which you aren't aware of their idea, Your brain generates thousands of ideas, which will get archived in ur brain, they won't go anywhere, they will be in your toolbox, now the next time you wanna solve a problem, Your tool box is bigger, and also since you haven't read that idea and your brain got it on it's own, you'll have the deepest way of understanding of it.
So don't fear of that, rather wish that, wish that that is the case. spend a year on it, and learn a thousands new ideas, and when u solve that problem, it gives you such a confidence boost, that u can solve 10 more harder problems with it
And even if u gave up and read the editorial, don't look at the code by no means, read it 10 times, if u couldn't understand why the logic works, think about it, think about it for a year, understand it as best as u can, use it to derive new logics. Not just ok so i'ma copy the code and get AC, that AC is worth shit. but when u look at the editorial, think about it, reason with yourself, get it on the paper, work with the math/proof; you learn the best
we see -iq ppl downvoting