Mini Programming Contest Achieves Impressive Results in the First Half of 2017

The Mini Programming Contest (MPC) is a monthly programming competition for Programmers (PG) across all branches of GMO-Z.com RUNSYSTEM. It aims to create an exciting and meaningful playground for developers who enjoy solving challenging problems through coding.

In the first half of 2017, four MPC rounds were successfully held in March, April, May, and most recently in July. The contests covered fundamental yet essential topics for coders: Algorithms (with problems such as Gravity and Derivative), New Technology (building a Facebook Chatbot), and Databases (Check Expenditure). These contests attracted enthusiastic participation from PGs across all branches. Familiar names in the MPC leaderboard include Nguyen Van Hung (BrSE Hanoi), Van Tan Loi (Fresher Ho Chi Minh), and many others.

In 2017, the contest introduced several changes in both format and scoring, including fixed exam times and dates, scoring based on the number of correct test cases, and tie-breaker rules. These adjustments aimed to make the contest more standardized and fair for all PGs. The most consistent and “fearless” participants have been the Fresher team from the Ho Chi Minh branch, who never miss a contest. Through these competitions, PGs have significantly improved their ability to optimize code, producing shorter, faster, and more efficient solutions, thereby enhancing their programming skills.

Sharing his thoughts on the contest, Van Tan Loi (Ho Chi Minh Branch) said:

“I find the contest very interesting and useful, as the knowledge can be applied to real-world tasks such as queries and quick calculation algorithms. It’s both entertaining and rewarding with a small prize, while also helping me sharpen my knowledge of parallel algorithms and refresh basic techniques. My only wish is for the contest to be held at a different time—because it’s really hard to focus when you’re hungry at noon!”

In the second half of the year, the Mini Programming Contest is expected to continue bringing exciting new problems in core knowledge areas, while also expanding into new topics such as emerging technologies, mobile, mapping, and more.