30 Days - Solving a problem with code

For years I have participated and actively trained for programming competitions. On a eval of my past I recognize those problems have contributed a lot, if not totally, to my current algorithmic skills. But on the last year I have almost stopped practising or exercising those skills.

I do still enjoy solving problems, but I turned incredibly lazy to implement solutions in actual code or even to read problems. I actually already suffer from it on the last years of ICPC, where an easy problem would be set aside if the implementation or text was boring. The only problems that still really excite me and my eyes shine to solve are the ones submited to air-domjudge [1].

So with the purpose to fight this code-laziness, in the beginning of October I set up a 30 days quest to myself: Solve a problem with working code per day. The idea was to write some working code per day, whether it was a script to some task in hand or to solve a programming problem. The final outcome was: 4 scripts written + 16 accepted problems and 1 not solved problem with WA (I was to sleepy to fix it) on codeforces.

In the end I considered it to be a failed quest. Not that I failed in skill or time availability, but that I lacked motivation to try to solve a problem per day. On the other hand it did increase my motivation to get back to problem solving but it was a pity I did not got time to do any competition. I hope that after stabilize my life and time-tables I get into the regular online programming competitions. That sounds like it will work much better to exercise my skills than to force me to solve a problem per day.

For this coming month many things will change in my life, so my quest is going to be really simple: Exercise everyday in the morning, afternoon and evening! I have been on recovery from a surgery and for 2months and I have been doing this quest for long. But now its the time I won't feel the need to keep up the exercise, so I will need to use my motivation to make sure I don't stop and I fully recover to an healthy and sporty state.

[1] air-domjudge: when you submit your mental solutions to your ICPC team-mates which ought to challenge it's validity. Usually performed during lunches or air-flights to competitions sites.