forcolin - 2022-04-17 3:32 PM

For Mechanical Sudoku: Can any of the fragments overlap with one of the existing givens?
For LMI road: can two shaded cells (or half cells (share a side?
stefano

moeve - 2022-04-16 9:05 AM
What about CJK's question:

Of course, programming is usually not allowed in puzzle contests -- but ususally there are no optimization puzzles and especially for No. 11 it is obviously quite tempting to do some... ;)

forcolin - 2022-04-19 5:43 PM

puzzle 11: only integer numbers or decimal allowed?

moeve - 2022-04-19 3:57 PM


?

Riad Khanmagomedov - 2022-04-17 2:30 PM


Hi Stefano,
1. It is not forbidden, but the fragments do not overlap each other.

Carlos - 2022-04-20 11:18 PM

Hello,
It would be convenient to know if we have to use only paper/pencil for the optimization problems, in order to be rated on the same criteria...

Riad Khanmagomedov - 2022-04-20 7:20 PM
Hello,
I always use only paper and pencil, because I am not a programmer.

CJK - 2022-04-21 12:50 PM


Hello Riad,
I have to admit that it is a little bit frustrating that this simple question cannot be clearly answered by you, even after being repeated five times. I do not really understand why it is that difficult to just say "yes, programming is allowed" or "no, programming is not allowed".
To be clear: I have no clear opinion about whether it should be allowed or not (I haven't programmed yet and I probably won't have time for it anymore), but I dislike the fact that you ignore one specific question for a whole week while answering every other question just a few hours later. For this contest it may be too late, but please don't do this in future contests again.

Swagatam - 2022-04-21 7:15 AMA couple of questions: For optimizer puzzles, any optimizer puzzle1. How do you approach to final solution from your initial guess/solution?2. How do you become aware of that you have reached to the optimum solution?

Riad Khanmagomedov - 2022-04-20 11:28 AMI see errors in some answers to 12. Record score. Two white players cannot pass to each other if there is a black player on the line between them. And two black players cannot be connected by a straight line if there is a white player between them.

kiwijam - 2022-04-22 10:49 AM

I was seeing strange messages earlier like "contest is over" and "click link to participate unofficially", even though there is still 13 hours left.
But when I returned to the answer page after submitting it looked normal, so I think they can be ignored...

auroux - 2022-04-21 10:47 PM

That depends on the specific optimizer, but basically I first try to build a solution, any solution. Then to think about how happy I am with that solution in the context of the quantity to be optimized, whether my solution could be improved by small changes, or whether a redesign from scratch, building the solution a different way, would likely give a much better answer. After a few attempts, usually, one has a sense of whether one has produced something good (possibly close to optimal) or if it feels that there are some guiding principles that aren't understood yet. And of course, often, there are BIG surprises when discovering what other people have managed to do with the same optimizer problem. I don't want to comment too much while the contest is going on, plus I'd risk making a fool of myself if I made hasty pronouncements and it turns out my solutions are really really far from the optimal ones, but after initial skepticism I became quite fond of this year's optimizers. I think they are extremely well designed, in the sense that one can profitably approach them by hand and get a sense of how they work; and, if I dare say so, I don't think computer brute force search would be particularly more helpful on these than careful thinking and formulating intuition.