Unprecedented participation, an exciting problem set and a contest that sails by smoothly. Is there anything that we, at CodeChef, desire more? Well, not much. We do wish that the all the problems in the set were tackled and the whole platter feasted on, but more to come on that as we move on.

The feast of July Cook-Off is over now and it was a contest enjoyed by many. The chefs responsible for serving such a delectable assortment of problems are Hiroto Sekido and Maxim Kolosovskiy, our setter and tester for the Cook-Off. Helping out Maxim with additional testing responsibilities was Anton Lunyov. He provided the much needed further insights on the testing process of the problems. Incidentally Anton also happens to be our editorialist for this Cook-Off and has put in some sleepless nights into the job; something that we totally appreciate.

Thanks to the three chefs, a new record for participation for the short contests has been set and how! With 993 total users and 3592 total submissions, the numbers speak for themselves. Let us check out the stats for this contest.

We surely like what we see, but let not the stats take away the thunder from the winners of the July Cook-Off. We wholeheartedly congratulate mikhailOK for winning this short contest in style. He got a notch above everyone else by being the only one to solve CIELNUM3, with only half an hour to go for the end of the contest. That proved to be the decider of his fate and he edged his way to the first place, past yeputons who had been ruling the roost before him from the start. After that yeputons settled in for the second place. Good going! Many congratulations to both of them.

The July Cook-Off rankings remained more or less the same from the start of the contest. The leaders on the ranks showed up early and dominated the top places in the order of yeputons, mikhailOK, sereja and Fdg. EgorK, our winner of the July Challenge, appeared a little later than the others and soon settled in at the fifth place. All of them were quick to solve CIELRCPT, CIELTOMY and CIELMAP. The three problems saw numerous submissions and CIELRCPT turned out to be the first and only problem in CodeChef history to have received more than 900 submissions. It was also the first of the set to get a successful submission, by logicmachine within first three minutes of the contest!

In a way, the three mentioned problems were the levelers of the July Cook-Off.  It was the harder of the creations of Hiroto Sekido, Maxim Kolosovskiy and Anton Lunyov, CIELNUM3 and CIELBALL, that tested the mettle of everyone. Finally it was CIELNUM3 that tilted the scales in favour of mikhailOK. CIELBALL remained unsolved till last, which left us a little surprised and wondering.

The final top ten rankings are in the order of:

1.)  mikhailOK
2.)  yeputons
3.)  sereja
4.)  Fdg
5.)  EgorK
6.)  Gassa
7.)  zglicz
8.)  chaemon
9.)  ilyakor
10.) gerald

The list above is conspicuous by the absence of Gennady Korotkevich, the star of our short contests and the winner of the last four Cook-Offs. It is truly said that absence is sometimes more striking than presence, but I am sure Gennady’s absence facilitated the chances of others bagging the top spot. Don’t get us wrong; we did miss him but at the same time it was novel to see someone else win a Cook-Off for a change. Apart from Gennady, other vetrans like lyrically and KADR too gave this Cook-Off a miss. All three of them happen to be the top rank holders for the June Cook-Off. We are a little curious, but at the same time hopeful that they will be back soon.

On the home front, pulkit turns out to be the Indian placed highest at 43 in the rankings. Next is rizwanhudda at 53. Congratulations! Worth mentioning here is that the participation of Indians too has been the highest ever. With time, and practice, we hope their rankings will see a surge too.

Seems like the only thing left desirable after a satisfying meal of an intriguing problem-set are the correct answers to it. We bring to you the dessert of the day; Anton’s editorials for the July Cook-Off. Savour them and let us know your thoughts. We are eagerly looking forward to your feedback on all aspects of this short contest and everything else.

The July Cook-Off is behind us now but we are not just basking in its glory. The frantic planning for the menu of the August Long Contest is already underway and the chefs in our kitchen are working in full swing. Make sure you are at the right place on 1^st August, 2012 at 03:00 pm to meet the problem-set head on. We assure you that the coming challenge is going to be full ten days of coding fun.

Last but not the least; do flip over to the practice section to work on the problems of this Cook-Off at leisure. I know that many of you may have been disappointed at being unable to crack CIELNUM3 and CIELBALL, but the best of learning comes from the toughest of challenges. And we have never let ourselves forget that learning is central to the CodeChef philosophy.

With that I will take your leave. Looking forward to the next time I meet you at the August Challenge. Hope you are too.

Au Revoir.

-Ankita

Team CodeChef