Programming Contest Problem Types

Hal Burch conducted an analysis over spring break of 1999 and made an amazing discovery: there are only 16 types of programming contest problems! Furthermore, the top several comprise almost 80% of the problems seen at the IOI. Here they are:

• Dynamic Programming
• Greedy
• Complete Search
• Flood Fill
• Shortest Path
• Recursive Search Techniques
• Minimum Spanning Tree
• Knapsack
• Computational Geometry
• Network Flow
• Eulerian Path
• Two-Dimensional Convex Hull
• BigNums
• Heuristic Search
• Approximate Search
• Ad Hoc Problems

The most challenging problems are Combination Problems which involve a loop (combinations, subsets, etc.) around one of the above algorithms - or even a loop of one algorithm with another inside it. These seem extraordinarily tricky to get right, even though conceptually they are ``obvious''.

If you can master solving just 40% of these problem types, you can almost guarantee a silver medal at the IOI. Mastering 80% moves you into the gold range almost for sure. Of course, `mastery' is a tough nut to crack! We'll be supplying a plethora of problems so that you can hone your skills in the quest for international fame.

Hal Burch通过在1999年春季的分析得出了这样的结论，竞赛的程序设计一般只有16种类型，它们分别是：

动态规划

贪婪法

枚举搜索

标号法（染色法）

最短路径

最小生成树

背包问题

计算机图形问题

网络流

欧拉回路

二维凸包问题

大数问题

启发式搜索

近似搜索

其他题

最困难的是在循环中嵌套以上算法或综合应用以上算法，甚至循环中嵌套以上算法的综合应用。即使你将概念了解的很清楚，做对这些问题也很难。

你只需要完全张望仅仅以上16种类型的40％，你就有在IOI中夺银的实力。掌握80％你几乎可以确定将一块金牌收入囊中。当然，让你掌握这些算法不是我们的最终目的，我们会提供给你更多的练习充当你的磨刀石，磨厉你的竞赛技能。