About
Posted by Noah Weninger

The University of Alberta Programming Contest is an opportunity for university, college, and high school students in Alberta to show off their knowledge and skill in a programming competition.


Students will test their knowledge of algorithms and data structures with a set of programming puzzles requiring problem-solving, programming, math, and teamwork skills.


Two levels of competitions will be held, one for those with less experience to algorithms and one for students who have had prior exposure to contests or are in their later years of university.


The contest is free of charge; lunch will be provided to competitors at the U of A location.

Time and Location
Posted by Answer

Saturday, March 16, 2024.

Computing Science Centre (CSC), Room 1-59, University of Alberta.

  • 10:00-10:45 Contest Warm-up
  • 11:00-3:00 Contest
  • 1:00 Pizza Served
  • 3:10 Award Presentation and Solution Discussion

CHANGE FROM LAST YEAR
We will no longer be providing logins for our lab machines. You should bring your own laptop with the tools to compile and/or run programs written in the supported language of your choice.


Students who have access to our lab machines are permitted to use them, but no technical support will be provided. Note, not everyone with a CCID can access these machines. So if you don't know if you have access, you should either try to log in to a lab machine on the 1st floor of CSC before the contest or just plan to bring your own device.

Previous Contests
Posted by Noah Gergel

UAPC 2024 Links

All Contests

This link is for the practice contest, Division 1, Division 2, and Open Division. Open Division participants can just "join the contest" themselves. Official Div 1 and Div 2 participants must log in using the email address provided when they registered.


UAPC 2023 Contest Links (last year)

Warmup Contest

Division 1 Contest Link

Division 2 Contest Link

Open (Unofficial) Contest Link


Past UAPC Information

Solutions, scoreboards, Open Kattis links, and data for past UAPCs

Other Information
Posted by Ian DeHaan

Contest Format: Teams of 1 to 3 compete to solve a variety of programming challenges. These are similar to ones found on Open Kattis.


For good practice with the mechanics of this contest, try solving and submitting this easy problem on Open Kattis. Try solving a few more interesting ones for more practice.

We will assume everyone knows how to submit and get a problem accepted on Kattis. So ensure you try it out before you attend.


Each team is limited to using one computer during the contest. You are not allowed to switch computers during the contest without permission from the on-site contest director.


You may use any online resource you would like provided you treat it as a read-only resource. No posting questions to discussion forums, no sending emails, etc.

Misc. / FAQ
Posted by Joseph Meleshko

Disclaimer: This page may change a bit before the contest. Check back here by March 14 to see if things change.

  • Can I/we compete remotely?
    Yes, but U of A students and high-school students in the area are strongly encouraged to show up in person. Others are welcome too. Prizes will only be available to those who participate in person.
  • Which languages are supported?
    The ones listed here: The ones supported at official ICPC contests:
    C++, Python 3, Java, C, Kotlin
Register
Posted by Arseniy Kouzmenkov

Register using the following Google Form.

Cutoff is 7pm on Thursday, March 14.


We plan on running an Open Division (all Div 1 & Div 2 problems) for non-official contestants, registration is not required. You can simply join the Open Division from the contest URL.


Email zacharyf@ualberta.ca if you have further questions.

Perks
Posted by Brandon Fuller

Free Pizza


Prizes
Posted by Jason Cannon

All amounts listed below are the totals per team. Prizes are subject to change during the planning stages of the event.

Division 1
  • First Place - $400
  • Second Place - $300
  • Third Place - $150
Division 2
  • First Place - $250
  • Second Place - $175
  • Third Place - $125
Grade School
  • The highest placing grade school team that does not place in the top 3 of their division will receive $100. If there are grade school teams in both divisions 1 and 2 that would be eligible, the decision on which team receives the prize will be left to the contest organizers.
Rules
Posted by Johnson Wu

We encourage you to work in teams of three, but you may compete individually or in a team of two.

There will be two divisions: Division 1 is intended for people with some problem-solving experience and Division 2 is intended for people with less problem-solving experience.


Division 1 Eligibility Criteria
We will adopt the same cutoffs as the official ICPC. See here for their eligbility flowchart. Anyone who passes this criteria can register for Division 1: all team members must qualify. Grade school students are always eligible for Div 1. If you fail the criteria but only by "a bit", you can email the contest organizer (Zac Friggstad) to ask for an exception. For example, perhaps your studies were delayed or you have spent a long time in internships.


Division 2 Eligibility Criteria
The eligibility criteria has been drastically simplified. Simply put, to be eligible for Div 2 all team members must pass the basic eligibility criteria for Div 1 and no team member should have won any prize money in a previous UAPC/ACPC.

For questions about eligibility, email the contest organizer (Zac Friggstad).


In each division, the winning team is the one that solves the most problems. Ties are broken by penalty points.


Penalties points are calculated as follows. For each problem that is accepted, you receive M + 20*W penalty points where M is the number of minutes from the start of the contest before your first accepted verdict for this problem and W is the number of incorrect submissions for this problem before your first accepted verdict.