New wait time system.

[helgefmi]

I currently have 4 unsubmitted answers, and 2 hours untill I can submit again.. It's by no means a big problem, but I still have two suggestions:
1. Make it possible to verify if your answer is correct, so we can move on to the next problem knowing we have solved the problem.
2. Perhaps set a maximum waiting time? I'd think 1 hour would be enough of a turnoff for the kiddies that cheat. I currently have 106 problems solved, and have to wait 4-5 hours each time.

[x10]

Hi, everybody!
I don't think my idea has been suggested yet, and I think it will solve most of our problems.
Yes, I approve of the ant-cheat timeout, because I wouldn't like to have liars above me.
But right now it just doesn't seem...natural. All those complex timeout calculations, the seven hours per easy problem, etc. I usually go to PE every once in a while, solve several problems in a burst, and then leave it until next time.

So, how about a per-day limit?
Doubtfully anyone will solve more than 3-4 problems per day(in the high levels) and more than 20 per day at the beginning? Or maybe even ten? Actually, on my first day here, I did 27 problems, but I still think that 10 per day for the 1-50 range is ok. After that, maybe have the limit diminish over time?
Right now, I don't think I can solve more than four problems per day, unless I dedicate literally every waking moment to Project Euler.

Also, on an related note - the tooltip for the timeout is not very useful. It is being blocked by NoScript *and* adds a horizontal scroll to the page(indeed, it is unreadable unless I scroll horizontally). Maybe it should be presented in a different way?

[ejconlon]

I'll chime in... PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE reduce the wait time a little. I'm on Level 2 now and can solve two problems in the time it takes for one wait time to expire! I can't live my life around submitting to Project Euler. (Well I could, and do sometimes... )

- Eric

[Jrdevil]

Hi, everyone! I truely understand why the new wait time system has to be implement, but PE brings us less fun since then.
Before the wait time system is implement, my labmates and I are competing with each other to see who can solve more problems faster. And the wait time system make it impossible since we always find that we have to wait until we can submit another answer and know whether it is right.
A per-day limit won't help, since we are enjoying our summer vacation, and we can spend a lot of time solving PE problems for fun. So I basicly agree that during the wait time, PE could let us know whether the answer is right.

PS: While I consider why a cheater would like to climb up the score board, I think a cheater would like to do it with little affort and/or in a short time. So the wait time is not necessary to be very long. Even if a cheater have to wait 30 minutes per problem, it will take him 120+ hours to accomplish his "achievement". During this time, the cheater has to repeat really boring copying and more boring waiting. A guy who can make it happen need good patient which I think any cheater won't possess.
So, before any other changes, PLEASE shorten the wait time...

[kordle]

I think it's probably important to let people at least check if their answers are correct at any time.
I can imagine good-faith problem solvers seeking out the outside tables just to be able to confirm their answers, and thereby being tempted to cheat/accidentally notice nicely structured answers.
You should avoid giving yourself a disadvantage w/r/t accessibility versus the pirate tables.
Decreasing the speed with which folks can climb up the charts, however, sounds like a quite reasonable change. I'm personally at the point where it's almost miraculous if I find 2 answers in a day, but newcomers will be put off severely if the delay time is very much. Presumably you can keep your eyes on the statistics and figure out a timing that's sufficient to minimize the cheaters without impeding the honest. Relating delay time to quantity of other solvers sounds sensible.
-dave

[sfabriz]

4 proposals:

1 - Change the copyright so that spoiling solution becomes something you're not allowed to do any more.

2 - Make everybody submit their solutions along with the answer? Do you have enough resources to do that? People could simply be forced to provide a solution (either code or explanation for the pen&paper fanatics) and solutions could be parsed randomly. You submit a fake solution? You're banned. Not just warned, banned. You spoil solutions on your website? You're banned for life. You come back with another account? As soon as you're caught again, you're banned again.

3 - Say goodbye to the ranking. This would solve the problem. If someone cheats is to go high on the ranking chart. I'd happily give it up if it was for a good cause. No more rankings, no more sense in being high in that. Those who really enjoy working on problems will keep playing here and those who cheat will have to seek for some place else for being considered the smart guys they're not.

4 - Do not let this time stuff affect so badly the good people, who are those on whom p.e. lives. You're pissing people off, for sure. If I had to wait to submit a solution, I'd really be mad at this thing. I hate having to wait. We wait all our lifetime, in the traffic, at the movies, everywhere there are people we must get into a line and wait and i tell you, nobody likes that.

I changed more than 20 challenge sites before landing here. I was looking for a place where people weren't begging for solution within the forums and where challenges were quality stuff.

Just my 2 cents. Really pissed off with cheaters this time.

[ymihere]

Whatever helps to raise the authenticity of peoples' performances is ok for me. That Speed-Index, or forcing people to submit the code or a description of how the solution was obtained sound interesting as well.

However, the reason why I am posting here is a technical question:
I had two result submission windows open (for two different problems). After I submitted the first result, which was correct, I still had the other window with the input-box. When I submitted the other result it told me that the solution was incorrect and I received the "please wait a few hours" message.

Can the "incorrect result"-message be caused by a timer which was activated since the window was opened, or was the entered solution definitely wrong?

-- Andreas

[Konrad127123]

Andreas: No, the solution was definitely wrong.

[x10]

Hi, guys!
I just discovered a bug in the new timing system.

In a sentence:
The new system does not stop cheaters not even one bit.

Not gonna slow them down for a second!
I discovered this independently from ymihere, but it is essentially the same thing.

The validation. It is on the wrong side of the problem.
Thankfully, it isn't just some client-side JS checker. But it still provides zero protection against cheaters.
A problem's "submit" permissions are only checked against the timer when a problem is opened.
I just submitted two problems in 30 minutes, despite having a 4+ hour limit.

How? I just opened them at the same time(before submitting the first one).
Again: No check is performed at submit-time, only at open time.

I can imagine a cheater opening 50 problems, and then laughing away at our expense.
On a related note, does Project Euler accept non-local POST requests?

[PhilTaylor]

This sucks so much, not having an internet connection I normally go and find some problems every week and solve them, uploading them when I next get on the internet. This is seriously going to impact people in less developed countries that don't have access to the internet all the time.

[euler]

Just to let everyone know that we have been listening very carefully to all the feedback and we've been working around the clock (literally) to implement a replacement system. Many thanks for all the responses and the constructive ideas that you've shared. Changes are imminent.

[fddddd]

Anyone else having the same problem as me? I solved a problem a few days ago, and came back just now, attempted to submit a solution and got automatically logged out. It won't let me submit a solution no matter what, is it something having to do with this anti-cheat system? Since I can't send requests to the admins via the form on the site I have to come here.

I'm probably going to get flipped so I might as well speak out.

Some strange anger is brewing here, cheaters? Who gives a damn, you really think rank on a problem site could give someone the edge in the real world? AFAIK I've never seem people showing off telling others about their rank on PE nor getting a job because of it (if they haven't been laughed out the door already).

This is just silly, I'm sure most people do these problems out of interest, rather than bragging rights.

Let's say someone cheated and got 250 problems solved, so what? And? What about it. I mean WOW he can tell others about his oh so big rank on PE, seriously what?

[/frustration]

[stranac]

OK, I agree that cheating should be stopped, but this is definitely not the way. I to, as many people who already posted here, think it's better to allow cheating, than to use this kind of prevention system.

I'm not sure how cheating could be prevented, but waiting 2 hours for a problem that can easily be solved in a few minutes really kills the fun.(level 2 btw)

I guess that's all.

EDIT: Just heard the news - the new system seems much better

[hk]

See: http://projecteuler.net/index.php?section=news

[Tommy137]

As there are some answers with five digits, let's think about something for the first user getting an identical captcha code to the solution

[hk]

Jackpot.
He gets all problems solved for free.
So if you find the answer is five digits: keep clicking for a new captcha until the captcha is identical to your answer.

[sfabriz]

Man, you're sick!
Anyway, the new anti-cheat system is much better.
I agree it won't cause any problems to honest solvers and this is what matters the most imho.
Thanks to the team who has the humility of listening very carefully to the feedback many users gave, this is one of those things that make projecteuler what it is.

Happy summer time to everybody!

[spivey]

I just made level 4 (hooray!), to be greeted with this (boo!):

You may not submit an answer to this problem for 3 days 23 hours and 35 minutes.

Something is wrong here, surely? Or does nobody believe it's possible to do 25 problems in 4 days, or whatever the limit is? I am a "genuine problem solver" and I certainly am "experiencing the restriction", to quote your news item, perhaps because I am doing a mixture of new, harder problems and old ones that I didn't get around to earlier. Please reconsider this new policy, or this genuine problem solver will get bored and leave Project Euler alone.

-- Mike

[ymihere]

I have the same Problem as spivey. I just dinged Level 5 and ...

You may not submit an answer to this problem for 4 days 23 hours and 55 minutes.

I am pretty sure that I didn't solve the last 25 Problems in 5 Minutes.
I rather solved ~5 Problems in the last 5 days.

[euler]

Panic not, guys. This sounds like one of those "features" mentioned in the news feed. Check your PM.