OREANDA-NEWS. May 24, 2012. Mail.Ru Group officially announces Russia’s second annual programming contest, Russian Code Cup 2012. The first qualifying round will be held on the website of the event on May 27, from 11:00 to 13:00 Moscow time.

Russian Code Cup is one of the largest arenas in which programmers can demonstrate their skills and original approach to problem solving. The contest will take place in three stages: three qualifying rounds, the semi-finals and the finals. Personal appearance will be required for the last stage only; the rest will be conducted through RCC’s site. All finalists will be awarded valuable gifts. The prize to the champion will be USD 10 000. Second and third place will be awarded USD 5000 and USD 3000 respectively.

The first qualifying round will take place on May 27; it will be followed by two more, on June 2nd and June 10. In order to take part, it is necessary to register on the site - registration is already open, and will run until the beginning of the third qualifying round, i.e. until 10:30 on June 10.

To reach the next stage, the contestant must place in the top 200 in any of the three qualifying rounds.  Those who do not reach the semi-finals in the first qualifying round, which will take place on June 16, will be able to try again in the subsequent rounds.

During the semi-finals, 50 programmers will be nominated to compete for the victory in the 2012 Russian Code Cup finals. The final round will be held in Moscow on September 10.

At each stage, the participants will face from 4 to 8 programming tasks. The tasks for the contest have been developed by the experts of Mail.Ru Group in association with experts of the National Research University of Information Technologies, Mechanics and Optics (NRU ITMO) under the leadership of Andrew Stankevich. Andrew is an Associate Professor of Computer Technology, winner of the President of the Russian Federation prize in the field of education, winner of the ACM-ICPC Founder's Award, and winner of the special award at IBM which is awarded for excellence in coaching.

To learn more about the event, as well as to get acquainted with examples of the tasks, go to Russian Code Cup’s website. The organizers invite talented programmers to log on and take part in the contest.