Anyone here going to compete in Google Code Jam?

I entered, but I'll only do it if they allow me to use Mathematica.
I've been told I can, then that I can't, so dunno yet...

I've considered running some of it in POV-Ray, though. :p

It looks like they allow you to use anything you want and then they use their judgment as to who moves on.

From:
http://code.google.com/codejam/rules.html

Solving problems using methods other than a programming language

If you use specific software to solve a problem, specify this in the file. Also, please provide any input scripts you wrote for the software (e.g., mathematical software scripts, Excel spreadsheet).

The program does not necessarily need to produce the output automatically, so it can be interactive. If you wrote an interactive commandline script, you should submit all commands used to solve the problem, e.g. a linux commandline with awk, Hugs commands, Matlab interpreter commands, shell commands, etc.
Solving problems using several programs

If you used several programs to solve a problem, even user-assisted programs, please submit all of the programs.

So I'd say it's allowed to use Mathematica, but you might not be one of the 500 finalists, based on whether they think your solution using mathematica was more or less "clever" than other entries using other programs, or programming languages.

Brian.
 
Brian, we actually went in the IRC channel for GCJ, and one of the operators there said some like "freely available" for the means of the software, meaning that if someone wanted to run your source, they could do so freely. There's no "official" regulations on it on the website (that we could find) but someone did say that. O well, I'm using python :)
 
I'm using python as well. I imagine many people are. Speaking of which, what IDE do you use for Python? I have trouble picking a good IDE for it. Eclipse is decent I guess, but I cant get it to autocomplete for some reason.

I wonder if anyone is going to use LOLCATS or whitespace or something funny like that
 
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I used Komodo originally, but have fallen back to the IDLE when i switched to mac. I didn't really think about using eclipse as an IDE, and I really did like it for Java. I'll have to look into it :)

What about Textmate?


I need debugging hardcore. I know, I'm a horrible programmer, but I like can never write a program without some debugging, even simple ones. For a text editor I'm using smultron though.
 
Heh, I might have to try this for kicks. Emacs is ok, but I can't stand how it tabs... I need to hit 'backspace' too often :o
I like notepad/wordpad... although coffeecup/dreamweaver which I recently dl'd are growing on me...
@lucas, wanna try something in rubik?
 
So who ended up doing it today?
XP, Notepad++, Python here
I totally forgot about it, and then started coding just over hour before it was actually due, all while at work pretending I was coding something completely different :) Managed to get 2/3, except the last one.

Question A (Search engines):
simple greedy approach worked for me. Go down the list until you've seen all engines, reset, count the number of times this happened

Question B (Train times):
I made a queue of all events, maintained number of trains at each station, starting from 0. (so i got negative number of trains at stations as they leave, but increase number when they come). Then take min of all number of trains at a station for each station and return absolute value of that.
I mean this one was pretty easy too

Question C (fly swatter):
I only had 10 minutes to look into this one, and it was pretty tough so i didnt get it. But i may have an idea. Basically i'd look only into 1/8th of the circle for symmetry reasons, and assume everything kills the fly, and then integrate all safe areas, and in the end divide. The integration could have been a pain in the ass though, especially in Python. stupid irregular recto-circular shapes :D



EDIT: link to questions:
http://code.google.com/codejam/contest/dashboard?c=agdjb2RlamFtcg8LEghjb250ZXN0cxjqOQw
 
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I totally missed it. I got the reminder, and wanted to start working on it, but something started to come up each time I wanted to work on them. I wanted to get into it more. Oh well, there will be more to come.

You can find solutions next to the competitors times here (have to check the solution download box).
 
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