2010

Canadian
Computing
Competition:
Senior
Division
Sponsor:

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 Canadian Computing Competition
Student Instructions for the Senior Problems

1. You may only compete in one competition. If you wish to write the Junior paper, see the
other problem set.

2. Be sure to indicate on your Student Information Form that you are competing in the Senior
competition.

3. You have three (3) hours to complete this competition.

4. You should assume that

• all input is from a file named sX.in, where X is the problem number (1 ≤ X ≤ 5).
• all output is to the screen

Since your program will read from a file, there is no need for prompting. Be sure your output
matches the output in terms of order, spacing, etc. IT MUST MATCH EXACTLY!

5. Do your own work. Cheating will be dealt with harshly.

6. Do not use any features that the judge (your teacher) will not be able to use while evaluating
your programs.

7. Books and written materials are allowed. Any machine-readable materials (like other pro-
grams which you have written) are not allowed. However, you are allowed to use “stan-
dard” libraries for your programming languages; for example, the STL for C++, java.util.*,
java.io.*, etc. for Java, and so on.

8. Applications other than editors, compilers, debuggers or other standard programming tools
are not allowed. Any use of other applications will lead to disqualification.

9. Please use file names that are unique to each problem: for example, please use s1.pas or
s1.c or s1.java (or some other appropriate extension) for Problem S1. This will make
the evaluator’s task a little easier.

10. Your program will be run against test cases other than the sample ones. Be sure you test
your program on other test cases. Inefficient solutions may lose marks for some problems,
especially Problems 4 and 5. Be sure your code is as efficient (in terms of time) as possible.

11. Note that the top 2 Senior competitors in each region of the country will get a plaque and
$100, and the schools of these competitors will also get a plaque. The regions are:

• West (BC to Manitoba)

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 • Ontario Central and West
• Quebec and Atlantic

12. If you finish in the top 20 competitors on this competition, you will be invited to participate
in CCC Stage 2, held at the University of Waterloo in May 2010. Should you finish in the top
4 at Stage 2, you will be a member of the Canadian IOI team at IOI 2010, held in Canada.
Note that you will need to know C, C++ or Pascal if you are invited to Stage 2. But first, do
well on this contest!

13. Check the CCC website at the end of March to see how you did on this contest, and to see
who the prize winners are. The CCC website is:

www.cemc.uwaterloo.ca/ccc

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Problem S1: Computer Purchase
Problem Description
In order to increase your performance on the ABC (Another Buying Contest), you decide that
you need a new computer. When determining which computer to buy, you narrow your search
categories to:

• RAM (in gigabytes), denoted as R;

• CPU speed (in megahertz), denoted as S;

• disk drive space (in gigabytes), denoted as D.

You perform some analysis and determine that the most preferred machine is the machine that has
the largest value of the formula
2 ∗ R + 3 ∗ S + D.

Your task is to read a given list of computers and output the top two computers in order of prefer-
ence, from highest preference to lowest preference.

Input Specification
The first line of input will be an integer n (0 ≤ n ≤ 10000). Each of the remaining n lines of input
will contain a computer specification. A computer specification is of the form:

• computer name (a string of less than 20 characters)

• the RAM available (an integer R with 1 ≤ R ≤ 128)

• the CPU speed (an integer S with 1 ≤ S ≤ 4000)

• the disk drive space (an integer D with 1 ≤ D ≤ 3000)

There is one space between the name, RAM, CPU speed and disk drive space on each line.

Output Specification
The output is the name of the top two preferred computers, one name per line, sorted in decreasing
order of preference. If there is a tie in the rankings, pick the computer(s) whose name(s) are
lexicographically smallest (i.e., “Apple” is smaller than “Dell”). If there is only one computer,
output that computer on one line (i.e., do not print it twice).

Sample Input
4
ABC 13 22 1

4
DEF 10 20 30
GHI 11 2 2
JKL 20 20 20

Output for Sample Input

Explanation of Output for Sample Input

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Problem S2: Huffman Encoding
Problem Description
There is an ingenious text-compression algorithm called Huffman coding, designed by David Huff-
man in 1952.
The basic idea is that each character is associated with a binary sequence (i.e., a sequence of 0s and
1s). These binary sequences satisfy the prefix-free property: a binary sequence for one character is
never a prefix of another character’s binary sequence.
It is worth noting that to construct a prefix-free binary sequence, simply put the characters as the
leaves of a binary tree, and label the “left” edge as 0 and the ”right” edge as 1. The path from the
root to a leaf node forms the code for the character at that leaf node. For example, the following
binary tree constructs a prefix-free binary sequence for the characters {A, B, C, D, E}:

That is, A is encoded as 00, B is encoded as 01, C is encoded as 10, D is encoded as 110 and E is
encoded as 111.
The benefit of a set of codes having the prefix-free property is that any sequence of these codes
can be uniquely decoded into the original characters.
Your task is to read a Huffman code (i.e., a set of characters and associated binary sequences)
along with a binary sequence, and decode the binary sequence to its character representation.

Input Specification
The first line of input will be an integer k (1 ≤ k ≤ 20), representing the number of characters and
associated codes. The next k lines each contain a single character, followed by a space, followed
by the binary sequence (of length at most 10) representing the associated code of that character.
You may assume that the character is an alphabet character (i.e., ‘a’...‘z’ and ‘A’..‘Z’). You may
assume that the sequence of binary codes has the prefix-free property. On the k + 2nd line is the
binary sequence which is to be decoded. You may assume the binary sequence contains codes
associated with the given characters, and that the k + 2nd line contains no more than 250 binary
digits.

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Output Specification
On one line, output the characters that correspond to the given binary sequence.

Sample Input
5
A 00
B 01
C 10
D 110
E 111
00000101111

Output for Sample Input

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Problem S3: Firehose
Problem Description
There is a very unusual street in your neighbourhood. This street forms a perfect circle, and the
circumference of the circle is 1,000,000. There are H (1 ≤ H ≤ 1000) houses on the street. The
address of each house is the clockwise arc-length from the northern-most point of the circle. The
address of the house at the northern-most point of the circle is 0.
You also have special firehoses which follow the curve of the street. However, you wish to keep
the length of the longest hose you require to a minimum.
Your task is to place k (1 ≤ k ≤ 1000) fire hydrants on this street so that the maximum length of
hose required to connect a house to a fire hydrant is as small as possible.

Input Specification
The first line of input will be an integer H, the number of houses. The next H lines each contain
one integer, which is the address of that particular house, and each house address is at least 0 and
less than 1,000,000. On the H + 2nd line is the number k, which is the number of fire hydrants
that can be placed around the circle. Note that a fire hydrant can be placed at the same position as
a house. You may assume that no two houses are at the same address. Note: at least 40% of the
marks for this question have H ≤ 10.

Output Specification
On one line, output the length of hose required so that every house can connect to its nearest fire
hydrant with that length of hose.

Sample Input
4
0
67000
68000
77000
2

Output for Sample Input

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Problem S4: Animal Farm
Problem Description
You are running a farm which has N (1 ≤ N ≤ 100) animals. You went to the store and bought
M = N pre-made pens that will house your animals. Pens satisfy the following conditions:

• pens have between 3 and 8 edges;

• an edge that is specified by two pens connects the two pens;

• an edge that is specified only once connects that pen to the outside;

• there is exactly one animal in each pen and no animals outside the pens, initially.

The animals, however, have a game they like to play called “Escape from the pen.” They assign a
cost to each edge of the pen, and they determine the minimum cost for all of the animals to meet in
the same area by trampling over the edge of various pens. The animals may meet inside a particular
pen or outside of all the pens. Also note that once an edge has been trampled, any animal may pass
over it without incurring any cost.
You will be given a description of the pens, along with the placement of animals, and you are to
figure out what the smallest cost is to move all the animals into the same area.

Input Specification
The first line of input will be the integer M , the number of pens. On the next M lines, there will
be a description of each pen, with one description per line. The description is composed of three
components, with each component separated by one space, as follows:

• the first component is an integer ep (3 ≤ ep ≤ 8), which describes the number of edges for
this particular pen p;

• the second component is a sequence of ep integers describing the corners of each pen, where
each integer is less than or equal to 1000;

• the third component is a sequence of ep integers describing the cost of each edge, where each
integer is less than or equal to 5000.

For the corner and edge cost description, the descriptions are given in cyclical order. For example,
the following description of a pen
3123746
means that there are three corners, and thus, three edges, where the edge (1, 2) has cost 7, the edge
(2, 3) has cost 4 and the edge (3, 1) has cost 6. Note: at least 20% of the marks for this question
have N ≤ 10 and no pen will have more than four edges in these cases.

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Output Specification
On one line, output the minimal cost that will allow all the animals to gather in one pen or outside
all of the pens.

Sample Input
4
3 1 2 3 7 4 6
4 1 2 4 5 7 7 2 6
4 4 7 6 5 4 8 9 2
5 3 2 4 7 8 4 7 4 7 7

Output for Sample Input

Explanation of Output for Sample Input

where the circled numbers are the corners, and the numbers in italics are the edge costs. Notice
that if the edges (2, 3), (4, 5) and (4, 7) are removed, all the animals can meet in the pen which has
five sides.

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Problem S5: Nutrient Tree
Problem Description
There is a binary tree with l leaves (1 ≤ l ≤ 50) where each leaf k has an amount of nutrients nk
(1 ≤ nk ≤ 10, 000) that it produces.
The branches (which you can think of as edges) of this binary tree limit the maximum amount
of nutrients that can flow to the root of the tree. You have X growth agents (1 ≤ X ≤ 2500)
that can be used to increase the thickness of an edge or increase the nutrient production of a leaf
node. Initially, each edge has a weight of 1 and if you give it w growth agents then it can transport
(1 + w)2 nutrients. Increasing the nutrient production of a leaf with initial value nk by s raises the
nutrient production of that leaf to nk + s.
Notice that when edges meet, the amount of nutrient that flows is the sum of nutrients flowing
along the incoming edges.
Find the maximum amount of nutrients you can transport to the root.

Input Specification
The first line of input will be a description of the tree. This description can be defined recursively
as either an integer nk (1 ≤ nk ≤ 10, 000) or as (TL TR ) where TL and TR are descriptions of the
left and right subtrees, respectively. The second line of input will be the integer X, the amount of
growth agents you have. Note: at least 30% of the marks for this question have l ≤ 5 and X ≤ 50.

Output Specification
On one line, output the maximum amount of nutrients that can flow into the root of the tree.

Sample Input
(5 ((7 1) (3 4)))
3

Output for Sample Input

Explanation of Output for Sample Input

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Notice that if we put two growth factors on the left edge of the root, and one growth factor on the
right edge of the root. Then, there will be 5 nutrients flowing from the leaf labelled 5 to the root
(since the capacity is (1 + 2)2 = 9 units of nutrients) and 2 nutrients flowing from the right subtree
(since the capacity is (1 + 1)2 = 4, but there are only 2 units of nutrients due to limits of 1 on the
edges attached to all other leaves).
Alternatively, notice that increasing the nutrient production of the left leaf of the root to 6, and
increasing the capacity of the root to the left leaf by 2 (to give a capacity of (1 + 2)2 = 9 units)
would cause 6 units of nutrients to flow into the root from the left tree, and the right subtree of the
root would produce 1 unit of nutrient.
In both cases, the maximum amount of nutrients that can reach the root node is 7.

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