MikeMirzayanov's blog

The November Revolution of Colors and Titles
By MikeMirzayanov, 13 years ago, translation, In English

Hello!

Today is November 7th. And this, as you probably know, is a very special day for many ex-USSR citizens. Many years ago on this day the Great October Socialist Revolution happened. I still remember red flags and military equipment on the avenue and the feeling of common joy and holiday. But today, in 2011, we have another revolution — the Codeforces revolution of colors and titles. Hooray!

So, over the last few months our community has grown significantly. If we count the users who have participated in the rated contests over the last 9 months at least once, at the beginning of the year they were 4330, and now — 7615. This is a great step forward! Of course, this leads to a dramatic rating inflation. Most of the ELO-like ratings have the same issue. For example, only A. Karpov had Elo chess rating of more than 2700 in 1979; however, there were as much as 15 people with such rating in 1994, and in 2009 they were 33. In 2001 there were less than 10 red players on TopCoder; in 2005 they were about a hundred and now — more than 250.

A similar effect occurred on Codeforces. It is particularly striking as it is accompanied by a marked audience growth. For this reason it was decided to change the color system . In addition, the record shows that not all participants liked the military ranks. Besides, they are quite far from our intellectual and sporting spirit. Today we will disband Codeforces as a military unit and introduce sport titles. We've mostly used the titles from intellectual sport games to work out the following classification:

Ratings Range Color Title Division
2600+ Red International grandmaster 1
2200 - 2599 red Grandmaster 1
2050 - 2199 Orange International master 1
1900 - 2049 Orange Master 1
1700 - 1899 Violet Candidate master 1
1500 - 1699 Blue Expert 2
1350 - 1499 Green Specialist 2
1200 - 1349 Green Pupil 2
0 - 1199 Gray Newbie 2

In addition, the rating recalculating formula was slightly fixed to slow down the inflation. Now the sum of ratings will not be the constant, but is likely to be slightly falling. In fact, the changes are cosmetic and will be visible only on a series of contests.

I understand that for some of you it will be hard to say good bye to the favorite color, but let's look ahead with optimism — new victories will bring the lost color back color and help to win the proud title of a Grandmaster!

MikeMirzayanov

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Comments Comments (47)
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13 years ago, # |
  Vote: I like it +17 Vote: I do not like it
I liked the new change in the Colors and Titles.

Thanks a lot Mike for your effort, you're making the site more and more impressive.
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13 years ago, # |
  Vote: I like it +2 Vote: I do not like it
I notice the graphs colors changes before you mention and really i like it , also Thanks to Admins for great efforts.
Now I'm Specialist  :)

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13 years ago, # |
← Rev. 3   Vote: I like it +4 Vote: I do not like it

the second division still consists of the rating range from 0 to 1699?

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13 years ago, # |
  Vote: I like it +8 Vote: I do not like it
The colors on the rating graph are too vivid.
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13 years ago, # |
  Vote: I like it +3 Vote: I do not like it
I see two shades in the green range but not in the others. Why have two titles within the same color? Or may be at least have multiple shades to distinguish between lower and upper band. 
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  • 13 years ago, # ^ |
      Vote: I like it +12 Vote: I do not like it
    Open tourist's profile, and watch double lines on green, yellow, red
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    • 13 years ago, # ^ |
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      Aha, cool. :)
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    • 13 years ago, # ^ |
        Vote: I like it +1 Vote: I do not like it
      Though it seems like the shaded colors appear only in the rating graph on a participant's profile. Participants' names still appear to be uni colored within the same range site wide.
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13 years ago, # |
← Rev. 2   Vote: I like it 0 Vote: I do not like it

Feeling sorry for the previous titles:They really suited the website's name-codeforces.
Anyways the new titles as you mentioned suites our intellectual sportive theme.
And as Barak Barack Obama says "Change We Need"

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13 years ago, # |
  Vote: I like it +15 Vote: I do not like it
+1 for changes

But I think that there is no such title as "International Grandmaster" in chess.

From wikipedia:
The abbreviation IGM for International Grandmaster can also sometimes be found, particularly in older literature.

But there is alternative. Again, from wikipedia:
The unofficial title, "Super Grandmaster", is often used by players to refer to those with a 2700+ rating to distinguish the most serious world champion contenders.
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  • 13 years ago, # ^ |
    ← Rev. 2   Vote: I like it 0 Vote: I do not like it

    Just like there are national masters there exist national grandmasters - at least in Russia. Unlike national masters, all but one Grandmasters of USSR were also IGM, but not the other way around. I do not have similar statistics for Russia

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13 years ago, # |
  Vote: I like it +1 Vote: I do not like it
The flags are cool :)
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13 years ago, # |
  Vote: I like it 0 Vote: I do not like it
The number of contest , we have participated must be shown in the profile page. I guess it is missing currently.
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13 years ago, # |
  Vote: I like it +1 Vote: I do not like it
What if someone from blue goes to grey, does he become newbie ? :P
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13 years ago, # |
  Vote: I like it -16 Vote: I do not like it
Why we need titles when we have colors ?
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13 years ago, # |
← Rev. 4   Vote: I like it 0 Vote: I do not like it

.. For me .. I think the color leval is a little bit sharp ... maybe more evidently than it used be .....  the color should from White to Deep Red .. gradually ..? .. after all ... you can't come acroos that purple is a transition period between the Green and the Red at the first glance...

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  • 13 years ago, # ^ |
      Vote: I like it 0 Vote: I do not like it
    Purple is between the Blue and the Red - try simple mixing colors.
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13 years ago, # |
← Rev. 3   Vote: I like it +1 Vote: I do not like it

I think Specialist doesn't match with a Coder. Because, a newbie coder is nice, a pupil coder is nice too, an expert coder is awesome, but a specialist coder doesn't match... Specialist match with an Engineer...

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13 years ago, # |
  Vote: I like it +13 Vote: I do not like it
Cool! The new titles inspire me to work harder. At least, tomorrow I will fight to regain my red :)
Anyway, in chess, players could keep their highest title, even after their ELO was dropped. Why does not Codeforces do the same?
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13 years ago, # |
← Rev. 2   Vote: I like it +5 Vote: I do not like it

I am more motivated now to increase my rating. I want to be candidate master.

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13 years ago, # |
  Vote: I like it 0 Vote: I do not like it
It would be cool to have the rating ranges evolve after each contest.
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13 years ago, # |
  Vote: I like it 0 Vote: I do not like it
Nice move! Hope to see CF growing faster :-)
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13 years ago, # |
  Vote: I like it +7 Vote: I do not like it
--- Self boasting. Skip if you like. ---
I am probably one of the most influential members of the codeforces community from outside Russia. Some time ago the "Problem Set" feature was provided due to one of my posts. Now we get change in the titles as I requested in another.
--- End of self boasting. ----

Thank you CodeForces for all the effort!. Officially there is no other system around the world that takes such a great care to provide its users with exactly what they want.
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13 years ago, # |
  Vote: I like it 0 Vote: I do not like it
Does this mean there will be less people in (div 1) per match?
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13 years ago, # |
  Vote: I like it +7 Vote: I do not like it
Like the new rating ranges :-) But I don't like the new titles. It doesn't suits with the name CODEFORCES. I think the previous titles were great :)
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13 years ago, # |
  Vote: I like it +1 Vote: I do not like it
Cool change :)
Another tiny thing that should be done in my opinion, although it might sound very secondary, is a pointer pointing to the point with maximum rating in someone's graph. Not sure about the benefit, but it sounds like a good idea :)
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13 years ago, # |
  Vote: I like it -13 Vote: I do not like it

Only Petr & tourist are  International Grandmaster

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13 years ago, # |
  Vote: I like it 0 Vote: I do not like it
Now there are official n00bs on Codeforces :)
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13 years ago, # |
  Vote: I like it +1 Vote: I do not like it
I like the new Titles
Feels great to know that the color "Blue" means an expert.
Also now there are official newbie's in Codeforces

This title is much more suitable than the previous one<now we can understand the differences in Tittles>
But I don't think the member differences in both divisions can be solved by this new rating system
Still it looks great :-)


 
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13 years ago, # |
  Vote: I like it +2 Vote: I do not like it
May be "International grandmaster" needs to have a distinct color for it other than red .. just like TopCoder having special color for targets :)
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13 years ago, # |
← Rev. 3   Vote: I like it +6 Vote: I do not like it

Nice changes.


Is it possible that put all the editorials on ONE WIKI page?  We had asked for this feature for a long time but still not implemented : (

Given that there are many good articles scattered on blogs,  e.g. http://codeforces.net/blog/entry/3107, it would be a good idea to collect them and make some tutorials on Codeforces. It definitely would  be very helpful, especially for novices.

It would be great if there were a special place for request new features.
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  • 13 years ago, # ^ |
      Vote: I like it +5 Vote: I do not like it
    I support the idea of making a page for all the editorials. Topcoder srm editorials are easily available but its often tough to find cf editorials .
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12 years ago, # |
← Rev. 4   Vote: I like it -33 Vote: I do not like it

[deleted]

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10 years ago, # |
← Rev. 2   Vote: I like it +55 Vote: I do not like it

The gray color and Newbie title is for 0-1199. What color and title will negative-rated coders like worse get?

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5 years ago, # |
  Vote: I like it 0 Vote: I do not like it

How did the old military ranks look like ?

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4 years ago, # |
  Vote: I like it -47 Vote: I do not like it

MikeMirzayanov I just noticed that 2600+ is "Red" and 2200-2599 is "red" and there isn't 3000+ Legendary grandmaster title

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