ICS News Archive

UCI team competes against top programming talent at ACM-ICPC World Finals

Having challenged themselves and their peers, UCI’s team “filter” placed 88th in the Association for Computing Machinery’s 2017 International Collegiate Programming Contest (ACM-ICPC) World Finals that took place May 20-25, 2017 in Rapid City, S.D. The event was hosted by Excellence in Computer Programming Inc. and held at the Rushmore Plaza Civic Center.

Team filter -- comprised of members Dan Chen, Waitaya Krongapiradee and Pasha Khosravi; coached by graduate student Timothy Johnson; and sponsored by ICS Professor Richard Pattis -- finished in 88th place with four problems solved in 396 minutes. The leading North American team was The University of Waterloo, finishing 18th overall with 7 problems solved in 1,019 minutes. UCI finished in the center ranks of the U.S. teams, with eight teams ahead and eight teams behind them.

“UCI has done well in the last few years against our local competitors UCLA, USC, UCSD, Cal Tech, Harvey Mudd and many others,” said Pattis. “We expect to continue to rise in the rankings and exceed our goals.”

The ACM-ICPC represents the best programming talent at the collegiate level, featuring 133 teams from around the world. The contest is a two-tiered competition where teams first compete in regional contests, held from September through December each year. The winning team from each regional contest then advances to the world finals.

Team filter placed first in the 2016 regional competition, securing its spot in last month’s final competition. Having earned their place in the finals, Chen, Krongapiradee and Khosravi had the experience of a lifetime in Rapid City. They challenged themselves against formidable rivals from other top universities to sharpen and demonstrate their problem-solving, programming and teamwork skills. In addition to enjoying an honorable spot in the final competition, they experienced local sites of interest, such as Mt. Rushmore, and attended several ACM-hosted talks that explored emerging aspects of current and future technologies.

Oh behalf of his appreciative team, Johnson said, "We’re very grateful to the ICS dean and our corporate sponsor MeridianLink for supplying us with the funds needed to compete and travel to the world finals.”

View the final competition scoreboard >