Not so Panic

There's tomorrow's programming competition that I'm going to judge whose questions I haven't seen yet (but I have been assured...), Friday's PSHS Univ Fair, tomorrow's bringing stuff over, and Friday's deadline of dropping, which requires me to check like a madman. I have to remember to call PSHS CS dept to see if I can ask for some temporary space for the alumni coming over at 1ish. I hope it all goes well...

Time... is NOT on My Side

Yes, it ain't.

Overkill

In pursuit of options, more than twice the needed were generated. The casualties: my odor, and the time that could have been spent on checking. Ugh. You'll hear that a lot.

The Sound of Silence

Tension as people await judgement. The judge busily cramming the knowledge necessary for an adjudication. Ugh.

Hoping for the Best

For the long examination, since explaining things only made my MHR class tenser. And for a short trip that will hopefully end up with more cash on my person, which hopefully will be safely transported to where I will need it.

Exanimation!

Second LE for 135 today. Was able to check the first seven that took it while I was catering to six 175 students. Lowest? 52. Everyone else passed. That's good, right?

Sick, Tired and Worried

Sick most of last week, still a little tired, partly from yesterday's exam, worried about tomorrow's examination, and the PSHS University Fair. And then there's the deadline for dropping...

Under the Weather

I am fairly certain that this is a cold/cough/flu that has to be slept in a day or so. Maybe tomorrow morning. I can't forget the other class in the afternoon.

Branch-and-Bound

aka Brute Force's Wise and Sensible Sister. A bit younger than Backtracking, but able to pick up on his technique, doesn't go headlong down a path. At every junction, notes the likeliness of a good path (may even go back to a junction which has a slightly better promise of a path!) and goes down each to the next junction. Meticulous, has the best eyes amongst the siblings, and sometimes comes with the best answer before either of her brothers. Will definitely know that it is best before anyone else does, and is often annoyed if Greedy Technique gloats about being there first.

Rush Rush

Because I didn't get to meet the TFR class last Friday, I took them through a whirlwind of greedy algos and backtracking, with stops on Huffman codes, knapsack 0-1, and revisiting brute force methods. Left n-Queens for Tuesday. I wonder if the backtracking method was clearer in the analogy, or in the reconstruction? I will ponder giving them more algos next meet.

Going Back

Backtracking a la Skiena seems like a hit for discussions. n-Queens is particularly interesting. Good sign, at least people aren't all sleeping.

Backtracking

aka Brute Force's Smarter Younger Brother. Can direct Brute Force to meaningful operations, avoiding blind run-ins and dead ends. Guides Brute Force back when faced with such a dead end. Isn't much faster than Brute Force, just slightly smarter.

Daylight Savings and Botch

It seems UVLE is experiencing some sort of Daylight Savings phenomenon, advancing by one hour and closing my submission bins (opened an hour before deadline) as soon as they were opened. Still that way, it seems.

In other developments, I still feel like I botched the PS#3 divide-and-conquer solution. I don't sound too convinced by myself.

Ugh.

Botched explaining how to get the divide-and-conquer solution to the longest ascending subsequence problem. Hopefully I can fix it for tomorrow. At least I can determine a bit for PS#4, MP#1, MP#2 and the extra 25 bonus points.

Ugh. Good thing the Pisay kids didn't watch me.

Greedy Algorithms

aka Myopia. Looks for the bex fix now, all the time. Gets the job done in the best way sometimes, but this doesn't happen too often. Needs guidance and preparation to get it done well, but sometimes, cannot perform up to peak performance.

Competition epilogue

Basically, no more posts after the blackout, and we check the unuploaded solution - no good. 33 submissions, 7 solutions, max of 4 for one team. I hate interruptions of the type that makes things unfair and undoable.

Competition

Today is the first Mock Competition in CS 175, where we will see if the students have learned enough to get by. This will also gauge competition readiness for Ateneo less than three months away. Much as there is anticipation, there is anxiety. This is also 25% of their grades. Will they make it? What will happen? Stay tuned.

9:24 AM (247 minutes remain) Three clarifications. Not much else. We're hoping for an average of four correct solutions.

10:18 AM (193 minutes remain) After a flurry of submissions, one correct solution. For a medium difficulty problem.

10:21 AM (190 minutes remain) Another correct solution, for an easy problem, this time. Output format problems, though.

10:42 AM (170 minutes remain) Opened the Tortillos. Still waiting. No Slurpys.

11:02 AM (150 minutes remain) Halfway through. Slurpys solved. :)

11:23 AM (128 minutes remain) Another flurry of submissions, slightly harder problem, without success. An important part of competition performance is determining the easiest problems and the hardest problems. The judges always want to make it hard to make that distinction.

11:27 AM (124 minutes remain) Two correct solutions, two different problems, two different teams. One breezed easy, the other outputting to screen instead of file. Tsk tsk.

11:34 AM (118 minutes remain) They may have just figured it out. Oh, they did.

11:37 AM (115 minutes remain) I guess they did.

11:52 AM (99 minutes remain) Another flurry of submissions. Hmmmm... at least people can shift gears when they need to. Don't smash your head against the same wall over and over.

11:56 AM (95 minutes remain) ... And it also pays to revisit problems which were seemingly unsolvable for several tries after fresh insight.

12:32 PM (60 minutes remain) Inet went down. One hard solution. Test data was wrong for that set.

12:47 PM (45 minutes remain) 45 minutes. One team at expected, most teams below. Can they catch up?

1:12 PM (20 minutes remain) All's quiet and not all's well.

1:14 PM (18 minutes remain) Spoke too soon. Light goes out in NEC. Two teams' PCs die. (No UPS)

1:21 PM (11 minutes remain) One team's PC dies, before uploading submission. Will check after.

1:32 PM (0 minutes remain)

Insertion Sort: Dynamic Programming?

Is there a sort the performs dynamic programming? By definition, dynamic programming relies on the optimal solution of subproblems to generate the optimal solution. Insertion sort relies on the first i elements being sorted.

Or is it selection sort that is dynamic programming? All I know is that bubble sort is brute force.

Dynamic Programming

aka Divide-and-Conquer's fatter brother. MO Insidious long-term planner, starts small, funds his larger rackets with returns from smaller heists. Doesn't step in until his brother's way in over his fool head. More concerned with means than his brother, but also is very fastidious with accounting and documentation of his activities. Most people don't know what he's up to until it's done and over with.