hac 1.0.1

hac - Helper for Algorithm Competitions

HAC is highly extensible and configurable command-line tool intended to ease the boring part of solving algorithm problems:

• preparing directory structure,

• preparing source-code files,

• preparing runner files (scripts used for testing solutions),

• downloading test-cases.

HAC can very easily be extended to work with:

• any programming language usable from the command-line,

• any runner (shell, Makefile, ant) usable from the command-line,

• any site that exposes information about contests/problems in an uniform and web-accessible form.

Support

Following sites and runner/language combinations are currently supported. If this bothers you, please check Contribute section.

Sites supported:

• Codeforces

Runners/languages supported:

	C++	Python
POSIX shell	sh.9 / cpp.9	sh.9 / py.9

OS supported:

• Linux (tested)

Installation

To install HAC you will need to have pip installed on your system. Since HAC messes with the file-system it is strongly advisable to install it in an environment of the regular user (to mitigate the responsibility that comes with power ;) ):

$ pip install --upgrade --user hac

Install as super-user at your own risk:

$ # ... switch to super-user
# pip install --upgrade hac

Usage

Special commands that don’t fetch remote data:

$ hac -h             # show help
$ hac --version      # show version
$ hac --copy-config  # copy configuration

Commands that fetch remote data and processes it (more info in Examples):

$ hac [options...] (prep | show) (CONTEST | PROBLEM) [PROBLEM [PROBLEM ...]]

For up-to-date list of command-line arguments and switches check HAC’s help message.

Tutorial

To copy configuration to user’s local directory (~/.config/hac by default, modifiable with HAC_CONFIG_DIR environment variable) run:

$ hac --copy-config

Modify user specific configuration by changing files in ~/.config/hac. File hacrc is main settings file. Total HAC settings are calculated in this manner:

• defaults are taken from hacrc from default-configuration directory (un-modifiable by user),

• settings are taken from ~/.config/hac/hacrc and those that are present there override settings from hacrc from default-configuration directory,

• settings are taken from command-line arguments and those that are present there override settings from ~/.config/hac/hacrc and default hacrc.

Files in ~/.config/hac sub-directories (lang, runner, site) over-shadow files in default-configuration directory with the same name. For example file ~/.config/hac/lang/temp.9.cpp over-shadows temp.9.cpp in default-configuration directory.

Template-part ~/.config/hac/runner/cpp.exec_compile.9.sh over-shadows cpp.exec_compile.9.sh in default-configuration directory. This template-part gets interpolated in temp.9.sh when runner sh.9 is prepared for any cpp language template. Modifying ~/.config/hac/runner/cpp.exec_compile.9.sh allows us change compilation flags or compiler used for C++ source compilation.

It is best to remove un-modified files in ~/.config/hac subdirectories to prevent over-shadowing of updated files in default-configuration directory. To remove all files in those directories run (careful, destructive):

$ rm -r ~/.config/hac/*/*

To copy all default-configuration files in a temporary directory (useful when you want to use any of the default files as a starting point for your custom file).

$ HAC_CONFIG_DIR=~/temp_config hac --copy-config
$ # ... change some files from ~/temp_config and copy them to ~/.config/hac
$ rm -r ~/temp_config   # remove temporary directory

When HAC is started, selected language templates are copied to the destination directories unchanged while selected runner templates are processed (interpolated) with corresponding template-parts. For example cpp.dbg_run.9.sh is interpolated in temp.9.sh at the point where $dbg_run label appears alone in the line in temp.9.sh file.

Examples

1) Display verbose information about:

• HAC’s configuration,

• available sites, runner and language templates,

• selected site, contest and problems,

• problems’ information for Codeforces contest #527.

$ hac -v -d0 show http://codeforces.com/527

2a) For problems “B” and “C” from Codeforces contest #527 prepare:

• source-file from cpp highest priority template (has lowest X among all cpp.X templates),

• runner from sh.9 template (gets interpolated for cpp language template),

• pre-tests downloaded from Codeforces.

$ mkdir ~/CF527
$ hac -w~/CF527 -d1 -t1 prep http://codeforces.com/527 B C

2b) Write solution for problem “B” and test it on pre-tests:

$ cd ~/CF527/B
$ # ... modify B.cpp
$ ./B.cpp.sh -e  # test solution on pre-tests
$ ./B.cpp.sh -c  # clean generated outputs

2c) Debug solution for problem “B” on 2nd pre-test:

$ cd ~/CF527/B
$ ./B.cpp.sh -d 2

Authors

Zoran Plesivčak created HAC and these fine people have contributed.

Contribute

Contributions are more than welcome! Please see CONTRIBUTING.

Change Log

Please see CHANGELOG.

Licence

Please see LICENSE.