The contest hosted yesterday by IIT Gandhinagar had wrong test cases in one of the problems. The contraints as mentioned in the problem statement were not followed as a result of which many of us were getting Runtime error or wrong answer. The problem link is and there are definitely test cases where Zi>k as I tried to submit it after the contest was over and was able to pass keeping in mind that Zi>k. I even asked for a clarification in the comments section of the problem but there was no reply from the problem setters.
See my comment link.
Here is my code link keeping in mind that Zi>k and this one without considering link
Now I request @admin to take some action against the contest organizer.
The only thing that’s likely to happen is that the problem will be removed from the Practice section.
A similar thing had happened in an external contest I had participated in. See this: https://discuss.codechef.com/questions/133115/wrong-problem-in-the-contest-coding-hours
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Well atleast something should be done to bring this to the notice of contest organizers
Unfortunately these things happen.
I had conducted a contest, I tried a lot to keep questions error free. But actually we generate random inputs by writing some program, and because inputs are too large, It is impossible to check them manually.
Yes, we do check the program to generate random input multiple time, but sometimes some errors left undetected.
In the contest, in a test case of This Problem , there was K = 0, which is impossible, participants reported the same and I modified the test case immediately.
Same contest, This Problem had strict time limit, and because of slow I/O in java, all java solutions ( including optimal solutions ) got TLE, I changed time for java to 10x, but still TLE.
Your frustration is understandable, but these kind of things are very hard to avoid, specially for those who setting problem for first time.
So, I am voting for NOT TAKING ANY ACTION and hardly any action can be taken for external contest.
It is very unfortunate for this to happen. There was one other hiccup in the contest that we were looking at. We are sorry for your frustration. What I meant to say by K \le N^2 was K \le max_possible$(N^2)$. While writing the generator for test-case, this was in my mind:
1≤N≤150
1≤K≤N^2
0≤Z_i≤K \le N^2 \le 150*150
Therefore, K \le 150*150.
I know this is incorrect reasoning, but I could not realise this while making test-cases even after verifying 2-3 times.
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I remember as I was the one to report regarding TL too strict TL for Java. xD
As for action against contest organizers, I too agree, that there should be no action against them IF THEY AT LEAST RESPOND. I didn’t participate in De’Code, but I happen to know how frustrating it is, to try a problem until the end of the contest, only to find incorrect test cases.
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Ok but there was no response from the problem setting panel even when I asked for clarification.
Never mind just update the problem statement constraints in practice section
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