Programming Contest Management System

The University of Scranton annually hosts a computer programming contest for local high school students who compete in teams representing their respective schools. Utilizing a contest management system is essential for running the contest effectively and efficiently. The web-based system described here, called Programming Contest Management System, or PCMS, serves this purpose. PCMS supports three different classes of users: admin, team, and judge. An admin user carries out administrative duties such as creating contests, users, and programming problems, as well as assigning teams and problems to contests. A team user represents a contestant and is therefore able to view problem descriptions, submit programs intended to be solutions to those problems, view judgments rendered on their submitted programs, submit requests for clarifications of problem descriptions, and view responses thereto. A judge user replies to clarification requests and renders judgments upon programs submitted by teams. A program deemed by a judge to be a correct solution is accepted and one deemed not to be correct is rejected. A companion (but standalone) application, which can be invoked by a judge from within PCMS, is the E-Judge, which can be used for performing automated (or semi-automated) judging of submitted programs. The E-Judge, provided with input data and corresponding correct output, is capable of evaluating a program written in any of several programming languages, including Java, C/C++, Python, and Pascal. It renders a judgment but also produces additional information that can be examined by a human judge to help him make a final determination as to whether to accept or reject the program