The Department of Computer Science and Engineering from the "Politehnica" University of Bucharest, had the honour to organise the 1997-1998 ACM Southeastern European Regional Programming Contest.

There were 30 programming teams registered, from Bulgaria, Greece, Macedonia, Moldova, Romania, Ukraine and Yugoslavia. Two teams from Ukraine have not been able to come to the Contest.

The first place was taken by:

from "Politehnica" University of Bucharest, Romania, with 5 problems solved and a score of 824 points.

The second place was taken by:

from the Sofia University, Bulgaria, with 4 problems solved and a score of 921 points.

The third place was taken by:

from the Bucharest University, Romania, with 3 problems solved and a score of 416 points.

The fourth, the fifth and the sixth place were taken, in the same order, by:

Teams’ task was to solve 8 problems in 5 hours using C or Pascal programming languages. At the end of the contest, none of the teams solved correctly all 8 problems. There were 1 team with 5 solved problems, 1 teams with 4 solved problems, 8 teams with 3 solved problems, 4 teams with 2 solved problems, 9 teams with 1 solved problem and 5 teams with no solved problems.

The contest computers were IBM-PCs Pentium 75 Mhz, 16 Mb RAM, 1 Gb HDD, linked by a network running Novell Netware 3.11. They were provided by IBM Romania. The site of the contest was the main hall of the "Rectorat" building, Politehnica University.

The evaluation of the results and scoring was based on the Personal Computer Programming Contest program (PC²) v6.1, developed at the Computer Science Department, Sacramento, California State University. The use of PC² permitted a smooth run of the contest and facilitated the activity of judges and runners.

The 28 teams totalled a number of 83 students , among which only one girl student : Elena Popovici from the "Alexandru Ioan Cuza" University of Iasi, Romania, and 30 faculty advisors and team coaches. There were more than 30 staff members and volunteers who contributed to the organisation and run of the contest.

Each member of the participating teams received prizes consisting of software kits of Visual Age for C++, Java and SmallTalk. The first three teams received presents from IBM-ROMANIA. All participants will be offered a free 1 year ACM Student Membership.

The program of the contest was:

14:45 - 15:30 Break

• Review the rules
• Introduction to the practice session

09:00 - 13:00 Sightseeing Tour of Bucharest

The contest budget was raised using funds from IBM, "Politehnica" University of Bucharest, Ministry of Youth and Sports, and Ministry of National Education. Participation in the contest was free of charge. Also the lunch, the dinner, the buffets, the banquet and the tour of Bucharest were free of charge.

Upon registration, each participant received a contest folder containing: contest badge, contest rules, contestant's guide for PC², timetable, information about Romania, ACM membership application form, software kits of Visual Age for C++, Java and SmallTalk, a pen and a T-shirt with IBM logo.

During the Award Ceremony, Certificates of Participation or Recognition were given to all participants and volunteers. Everybody seemed very excited about receiving the certificates, especially the volunteers, showing that the ACM idea of offering certificates was very appreciated.

Two press releases were issued: one before and one after the contest. Several newspapers published announcements or presentations of the event.

The composition of the Steering Committee was:

• Prof. Nicolae Tapus, Contest Director, Head of the Computer Science and Engineering Department
• George Metakides, Director of the Information Technology Programs of the European Community
• Iustin Tanase, Minister Secretary of State - President of the National Committee of Informatics
• Gheorghe Zgura, Rector of "Politehnica" University of Bucharest
• Vlad Tepelea, Vice-President of Romanian ACM Chapter
• Dan Roman, Director of IBM - Romania

The composition of the judging staff was:

• Prof. Cristian Giumale, Romania, Chief Judge
• Prof. Lorina Negreanu, Romania
• Dr. Nikolay Ivanov, Bulgaria
• Prof. Dragan Milicev, Yugoslavia
• Prof. Pavel Azalov, Bulgaria
• Prof. Efstathios Zachos, Greece
• Prof. Stevo Bozinovski, Macedonia
• Prof. Vladimir Mesyura, Ukraine

We want to express our thanks to Chief Judge Prof. Cristian Giumale, for his activity and constant help during the contest.

We would also like to express our thanks to ACM and to IBM Corporation, to the Romanian Society for Informatics, to the Romanian Chapter of ACM, to "Politehnica" University, and to the local contributors for their generous support for the ACM Southeastern European Regional Programming Contest. And last, but not least, we thank all the volunteers who helped run the contest. Without all these people and organisations, it would have been hardly possible to make this event happen.

Prof. Nicolae Tapus

Regional Contest Director

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The Results of ACM Southeastern European Regional Programming Contest