Among the features of Codeforces, one of which I don't understand is the rank table. But I'm not getting any suitable source to learn about those stuffs. Today I'm here to the community with my query. Notice the segment of the standings given below:
Question 1: What is meant by the section penalty? I'm also curious to know how this number is calculated.
Question 2: What is meant by the + sign and the number written just below ( colored green) ?
Thanks for having patience to read this blog. I'll really appreciate your help.
I'll explain by examples:
+2 means that a problem was solved after $$$2$$$ wrong attempts.
-3 means that a problem was attempted $$$3$$$ times none of which was successful.
-1 means that a problem was hacked of failed system tests.
The number like 00:23 that is directly below the + is the time elapsed since the start of the contest when the problem was solved, in the hh:mm format.
The penalty is the sum of all these times and $$$x$$$ minutes for each extra attempt on a solved problem.
For example, + (00:04) and +2 (00:36) is a total of 40 minutes and $$$2$$$ extra submissions. In that particular contest $$$x = 10$$$, hence the overall penalty is 60 minutes.
Similarly, + (00:23) and +1 (00:34) is a total of 57 minutes and $$$1$$$ extra submission, hence 67 minutes.
Note that you don't get $$$x$$$ minutes for wrong submissions on some problem if you haven't solved it.
Thanks for your great answer. I was really looking for something like this. So the key purpose of penalty is to determine the overall time elapsed on the solved problems and used in the ordering of the participants along with score. Am I correct?
Yes
Thank you so much. I am a newbie and it cleared my doubts like never before, looking at the standings during contests will not give headaches now.