Hi Codeforces!
Have you ever wanted to ask MikeMirzayanov about something in particular? Maybe how he began with Codeforces, what the challenges of running such a large platform are, or maybe some tips for becoming a top competitive programmer?
Well, we have quite an exciting announcement to make — Mike is in Barcelona at the moment for his course at Harbour.Space, and next week, we’re going to shoot an interview where he answers the community’s questions!
So, if you have a question, write it in the comments. Mike will choose and answer the top questions in his interview next week.
We will post the interview as a video on our blog, so stay tuned :)
See you around!
I imagine Competitive Programming as a sport was very different back when you started it.
And since you lived through most of it, how did it evolve through the years? Are there many new topics now than then? Did the difficulty change a lot? How was it having 1-3 online judges back then compared to having 20+ now? ...
2nd question; What do you think about these ideas? Do you have any ideas for new contest formats / new problem types / new innovations in CP? Do you even think we should be looking for something new?
.
Any suggestions why people downvoted it ? Did I abuse someone or write bad words to this community ? .... Well I don't think so !
Thank you MikeMirzayanov and his team for this beautiful platform :))
Basically, people voting for questions they like. And your question was downvoted. Probably, because it is very basic.
Yeah right ! people downvote when they see things are not happening in their liked way.
Maybe how he began with Codeforces, what the challenges of running such a large platform are, or maybe some tips for becoming a top competitive programmer?Ahh , I missed the given constraints !That's deep analysis, and it is actually true.
But in this particular situation I don't think that people were somehow offended by your question, they just don't find it interesting.
Look at it this way: Mike will probably answer only a few questions and I personally don't want one of these questions to be yours, because... well, it is not interesting for me.
What are the next big changes to expect on Codeforces?
p.s I love CF <3
Why do you not trust your round coordinators and force your problems into other's rounds?
As a yet-coordinator myself, I can only state that all Mike's interventions into the problemset I remember were reasonable and usually proved by the round's results.
In short, you wrote some nonsense that is not related to reality. And I will definitely listen to this opinion when one of the coordinators tells me about it. But it seems to me that I have good and even friendly relations with all the coordinators. And I am very grateful to them: this is a very difficult and stressful job. In short, they are my heroes!
I am sure that you do not understand the situation. You have some unhealthy desire to oppose me to the coordinators or authors. This is probably a manifestation of such youthful non-conformism.
KAN advised me to answer that I just regularly help the coordinators, insure and do part of their work.
It seems to me that it should be so, that I am the most indifferent, motivated and I just dream of beautiful and interesting rounds. I am sure that the round should be interesting to those whom we invite to participate in it. And if I see that testing or my experience suggests that a round can be unbalanced, then I can take responsibility and ask to add a problem, suggest some idea or even write a new problem by myself, if only this can improve the situation.
For example, in the last Div.2, the writers and the coordinator did an excellent job of preparing the problems, but I was afraid of a too huge difficulty gap from D to E. It seems to me that the round obviously got better with an extra problem. Without it, the number of official participants who solved D is 878, and the next problem is solved by only 4 official participants. It would be a failure if that really happened. In less than an hour before the round, I found the deferred idea and suggested the problem to add. It is fortunate that it was almost prepared in advance. Obviously, the round got better and inaction would lead to a disaster in balance. Fortunately, KAN and Rox were nearby, who helped evaluate the new problem and confirmed my concerns. Thanks to them!
Thanks for your answer.
In my opinion, you usually forget about that the quality of a round depends not only on ratios $$$\frac{AC(P)}{AC(P+1)}$$$ for all problems (yeah, I know that you calculate them in the interface, I was admin of some rounds), but also on beauty of each particular problem, on how they look together as a set and much more different things. And when you insert a problem just to fix ratios, it could decrease overall quality.
Next, contests are works of art. And problemsetter is the artist. They work in collaboration with coordinators (who are like editors to writers) to create something they see as beautiful. And then you came 1 hour before the round and say "this is bad, I have a fix". And insert your own short novel into other's book. I wouldn't like that.
In fact, this is not only a ratio, but it is an important part. And specifically in this case, it would be great if the issue could be noticed earlier and solved in a different way. But choosing between — leave as it is and add this problem, I am sure that I was right. As I wrote above: I consulted, listened to opinions, and only then a decision was made. By the way, this situation is more likely an exception. What do you think, how many times in six months did you have to do something like that? I looked at https://codeforces.com/contests/writer/MikeMirzayanov and tried to find rounds in which I was not an explicit direct co-author and where exactly I was the initiator of adding a problem. It seems that there are ~3-4 such rounds in six months. Too many?
Are there situations when you are not sure?
I think that it is much more than, let's say, 2 years ago. I will not give any opinions about is it "too many" or "not enough".
if u have this much problem with[user:MikeMirzayanov] and codeforces ,why do not u create your own platform and challenge codeforces?? mike created this platform and little bit amendments in problemset comes under his jurisdiction and I never expected talented people like you should speak this bitter .It is clear that you have personal problems with mike. Sorry for bit rude behaviour but i believe whatever mike is doing is good for community and u are just trying to make people squabble .I do not understand how he is capable to being online on codeforces atleast 15 hours a day .He is really farsighted and hardworking man .U should apologize to mike here publicly.
Thanks, now I can forget everything you said and sleep well. Please turn on your brain and evaluate actions, not the person who make them.
Careful, you're opening yourself up to the ultimate retort "ok boomer"!
Ok Boomer
As I used to be Codeforces coordinator for a period of one year, I think I can properly speak on the subject. I completely disagree with your claim, if Mike makes any attempt to influence round's problemset, that is reasoned only by his intention to make round better.
From my experience, Mike has an outstanding feeling of how the round will go and what troubles participants will struggle with in each particular problem. Thus, I always tried to consider his suggestions, and every time we agreed to accept Mike's proposals they significantly increased overall round quality.
I don't believe that last two comments appeared in one moment by accident, also your last comment was TWENTY THREE MONTHS AGO, so I'm pretty sure that Mike has asked you to write this. That's about lowering my trust to you as a person.
About the thing you wrote: I don't think that you closely followed CF in last year, so you don't really know what are you talking about. I think that in last few years direct interventions became a usual thing, much more common than it was when you were a coordinator.
Also, my question did not evaluate these interventions, just asked why they became so frequent, so your disagreement with "my claim" has nothing to do with my claim.
Actually, Gleb's last comment was 10 months ago, not 23. However, it was in Russian, so it is acceptable that you didn't notice it due to using English interface.
You are right, sorry about that. Point kinda stays the same.
Wow, I didn't know that people lose their right to have any opinion after some time of inactivity on Codeforces. It's certainly possible that Gleb somehow got to know about this drama from one of his friends and decided to express his true opinion which definitely didn't have to be forced by Mike
I agree with you, but at the same time it seems really suspicious that both comments from Mike and Gleb were made at the exact same time Jan/17/2020 03:32 UTC
Why does the footer say "The only programming contests Web 2.0 platform"?
because cf is the only programming contests Web 2.0 platform
What is the best source in English to learn algorithms and data structures for competitive programming?
What's your favorite anime?
Is he planning to add a new rating name ? forexample Legendary unrepeatable grand master ?
Will the beta ever be removed from the codeforces logo?
Wow, I never noticed the beta in the logo.
Questions start to be answered one by one :P
And now it is Gamma.
Yes
What's your motivation behind keeping the codeforces alive? How many hours do you put into it on average everyday? Do you earn anything out of it?
Do you compete in contests on any other sites? (Or on CF with a secret account?)
Mike has competed in google code jam (https://code.google.com/codejam/contest/2984486/scoreboard and I'm pretty sure in the most recent GCJ he made a thread about one of the rounds, but I can't find it).
On Hackerrank he has participated in only one contest and took 9th place.
Is it rated?
When we will have the first Codeforces onsite competition?
Will CF ever have full feedback, like AtCoder has?
With sufficiently strong pretests (and my understanding is that problemsetters already strive for this), Codeforces is already "full feedback".
So I guess the decision is whether you want to allow anyone with a bug undetected by pretests to pass (as Atcoder does -- I've written solutions that should TLE but luckily passed), or allow hacking/stress-tests for specific cases that testers missed and unique vulnerabilities in individual submissions (as Codeforces does).
You misinterpreted my statement, I meant whether CF will ever be able to test all the solutions on all the tests(including system tests) during contest.
I think sys tests are cool and intersting, they make you be more attentive
Afaik (from people who have authored cf rounds) cf has this ability. Contest manager can see which soln will receive which verdict after system tests (if no hack test cases are added). Soln does run on all tests during the contest it's just that verdict shown is the one which you get after checking first few test cases were the only test cases.
A better question should be — Why does this happen?
If what you say does indeed happen, why is there some time taken after contests for system testing? Is it done so that codeforces can keep its story about existence of system tests coherent? Why would they put so much effort into doing something pointless?
This has been discussed before and AFAIK, they have the ability to check the verdict, but they don't test every solution.
Oh, it seems I misunderstood. He said "they can see", so I thought every solution is already evaluated on system tests.
So, clarifying again, they have like a button "Evaluate" which tests a particular solution on the system tests right?
I don't think the goal is to remove hacks.
Is there any chance of dark theme option in future?
You can check out this dark theme for codeforces here
is this statement false?
This is not a statement
The previous comment is false.
What/who inspired you of making codeforces?
have you thought in merging codeforces with topcoder? CF has the infrastructure and TC had some high quality problems.
why does the censorship at cf exist? why are users muted for a harmless shittalk? ведьмаку заплатите чеканной монетой?
In my opinion most of the comments I've seen "disappear" are completely bullshit garbage. Like if you explained to an alien what a joke is and the alien then tried to write a "joke". I've seen some of this "harmless shittalk" and it's really annoying. I think muting certain users only does this community good.
I can see that with any kind of moderation in the comments there is always the danger of abusing it. But as far as I can see, Codeforces has used it responsibly. There is no kind of guarantee of "free speech" in online forums, and there doesn't need to be one. There are plenty of websites where you can stupid shit all you want.
will you change your name to -is-this-matroid-intersection-?
How many years of work it took you to launch Codeforces? And what was your goal behind it?
UPD: Will there be in the future a blind hour for icpc-styled contest here on codeforces?
According to you, what characteristics or qualities one must have to become a future top competitive programmer?
Why "Codeforces"?
Do you have any plans of implementing something like the lockout tournament recently arranged by ecnerwala and scott_wu?
Something where 1v1/2v2 competitions can be held and the system itself will pick out problems according to the participants rating.
What will happen to Codeforces after you die?
Will there be the "Codeforces 10 years" campaign where we would be able to donate?
How the idea of making Codeforces comes into your mind?.
Do Mirzayanov's pawns actually exist?
Do you and upvoters understand and it sounds rude and ugly in relation to other people?
Sorry if this was offensive, I personally would be honoured to be one. But this a hoax, I get.
It was a joke (was it?), and I personally don't find it that rude... Unless there is some truth behind it :/
Will there be another colours revolution?
well, I asked the same question, and got -64 contribution. I don't care any way ...
2. do you have girlfriend?Will mike ever appear at the top of the contributors list ;D .
He was top contributor if you look at code forces in the web archive. He removed himself from #1.
What do you think about subtasks in problems on Codeforces? Will you keep subtasks as independent problems or do you have some other ideas for subtasks in the future?
do you think competitive programming is becoming an e-sport? are there some initiatives in that direction?
Anyway, the question is still valid. I think competitive programming should be at the same level as chess or in worst case to esports. I mean it should be possible to be a professional competitive programmer.
regarding abbr: cp=sp (sports programming), so let's call it esp
I kinda like this one, because the other meaning of esp person is kinda funny w.r.t. to sports programming.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bO8IaV_DAoY
do you include physical exercise in your competitive programming coaching?
What are your thoughts on a Team vs. Team (or 1 v 1) duel system similar to what was done in this livestream? It seems like it has potential for increasing public interest in SP and it also seems like it would be really fun to participate in.
Second Question: Are there any plans for a way for other people to help contribute to the development of CF? You have a massive community of hardworking, extremely talented programmers at your disposal who have the ability to help (by fixing bugs, cleaning up CSS, adding 'copy input/output' buttons to sets from a long time ago, et cetera); I'm sure many of them would want to help make the site better if they had the chance.
Why harbour space doesn't host also div 1 rounds?
how are you?
what is your favourite platform
Has anyone ever made an offer to acquire Codeforces?
The best question I’ve seen.
Exactly.
With codeforces being a non-profitable site, how do you pay the problemsetters and testers?
Someone pays testers?
Maybe, I am just asking. Well, they won't work for free, will they?
They will :D
Not that there are any proper testers with responsibility and stuff.
Do you mean "non-profit"? If so, it's fairly simple — they're sponsored by Telegram, as it's presented on the banner at the top of the page, and the money is probably spent on holding the rounds, giving out some prizes, paying the setters and coordinators etc. CF simply won't aim to earn money through organizing the contests (and if they somehow do, it should be used as operating expenses).
Frankly, I didn't find anything about CF being non-profit, though. Although I believe it, do you have any sources on this?
What's your favourite Windows or Linux or MacOS?
when codeforces going to have dark theme ?
Almost the same (and already answered) question.
How did the idea of " Hacking Phase " came up in your mind ?
from topcoder?
Are you planning to improve the educational side of Codeforces by adding categorized educational content?
I know that solving problems and reading editorials is a good idea, but sometimes we don't know what we are missing and where to learn it from in an official way.
I think it's better to be like this:
here is what you need to know about this_topic(say Number Theory) and here are some problems to solve. Enjoy!!
learn, then go to practice and learn more tricks.
Example.
it may come with great benefits like users will stick around and will no more bother jumping from site to site to just "learn" something, also it will attract more newcomers I think.
for me, I'm now using Hackerearth and CP-Algorithms to learn new things, but if Codeforces had something like that, I definitely will use Codeforces.
Who according to you is the best competitive programmer on codeforces?
tourist
Pepsi or Cola?
Diet Coke
Uhh Mountain Dew da best. K bye thanks.
If you could go back and change one thing about the way you created Codeforces, what would it be?
Making it dark themed from the beginning.
What do you think about support of other than C++ languages at CF? Why C# is two years late here? It has Mono 5.18 (Feb 2018) while there is already Mono 6.8 with C# v8 RC or even Core.
C++ is a bad example, since GCC 7.3 release was 25 Jan 2018.
G++ is up to date with the C++17 standard (for example, v6 doesn't have all features that C++17 should support, even with
-std=c++17) and the changes made from v7 to v9 are mostly irrelevant for CF.Maybe the other C++ compilers are less up-to-date and upgrades would improve performance, but GCC is fine.
Will you create mathforces? I think that would be great)
hello [user:dannmaster] i cannot dm you so i will talk to you here will that be okay
Okay)
i have created a watsaap group do you want to join it or just want links of the vc's
Wow. yeah, i want to join
just dm me your number
When the codeforces rules virtual participation?
My hobbies include swimming, cooking, and reminding people that something is due.
Remember when Harbour.Space promised us an interview? Pepperidge Farm remembers.
A similar thing was done by Endagorion almost an year back. He promised a Q&A video but never made one. I really hope that the same thing won't be repeated here. :)
Sorry about that. =\
Yes, two questions actually. Why do you keep ignoring users who want to make Codeforces better? Why you don't care about cheaters in Codeforces?
If you want to know why I'm asking this you might want to take a look at this blog.
How to balance and come up in another round when some round goes too good for you and the next or another too bad. That is how to maintain consistent performance.
How big is the team operating Codeforces from backend or you do it yourself alone?
Will you ever compete with us in a contest? Like let the coordinators organise a round alone if possible so that you can compete too