estoy-re-sebado's blog

CP is hard? Try breaking both hands
By estoy-re-sebado, history, 4 months ago, In English

I recently broke both of my hands, which forced me to type rather slowly, so I've had to come up with some strategies to optimize my contest performance and so on. To be honest, it wasn't that bad (and it's less noticeable the longer a contest is, as implementation speed becomes less relevant. For example, I got 11th place on a 5 hour individual contest at the Brazilian ICPC Summer School a week ago) but I'm still very happy to announce that they removed both my casts today and I'm finally back to "properly" coding using both hands.

I say "properly" in quotes because I'm not really back to 100% yet, as months of immobilization caused my muscles and ligaments to slightly atrophy, which causes some stiffness and pain when I move the affected joints. This is apparently easily solved by a month of rehab :^).

Also, because of the way the bone came back together, the index finger on my right hand is now slightly rotated towards my middle finger, which makes my index finger kinda bad for typing. This can be solved by further surgery or, apparently, by just twisting it into the proper alignment over the course of a year, which will slowly reform the bone into its proper shape. (I should be able to consciously keep it in proper alignment using my hand muscles after rehab, so it should be fine for practical purposes much sooner)

My rating will probably tank but I'm doing the upcoming div2 nonetheless (see you there!). After all, we have the ICPC LATAM super regional coming up in march, So I can't afford to stop training right now.

Finally I want to show some pictures of what the casts look like, the scars from the surgery (which I only had on my right hand), and a right hand x-ray I got today.

pictures

See you on the next round!

Cheers

UPDATE: rehab is progressing smoothly — I reached master for the first time in the last contest :^)

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4 months ago, # |
  Vote: I like it +18 Vote: I do not like it

Thanks for sharing your journey with us. It's amazing how you've handled everything with such positivity. Your story really hits home about how we often overlook our health until something happens. Wishing you a speedy recovery and looking forward to seeing you fully back in action soon. Take care and catch you in the next round, tiger!

Cheers... （￣︶￣）↗　

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4 months ago, # |
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You don't code with your feet?

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4 months ago, # |
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Before anything -- thanks for sharing & cheers for getting your hands back and never stopping improving despite anything.

What I want to ask from you is a list of tips you got from the experience. I've read your previous posts -- stuff like starting from D and C in div2 to get more points.

I believe it'd be very valuable for the community.

I wish you a fast recovery :) Broke my back recently & was taken back from the gym as a result. Know how much this shit sucks

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    4 months ago, # ^ |
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    My advice for codeforcers with broken hands:

    • If you can solve div2ABCD but don't have enough time to implement all of them, prioritize D then C, etc
    • Spend a bit of extra time to work out each part of the implementation before writing it, as deleting and rewriting can take a long time
    • Spend a bit of extra time to think of ways to simplify and shorten implementation before writing it, as long implementations can take a long time to write down
    • Use one letter variable names (You might already be doing this, but I usually didn't before breaking my hands, as I sometimes forget the meaning of each variable.)

    I think these tips are very bad advice for the average codeforces user, as most people are not severely limited by their typing speed. For most people, if they don't solve div2D it's because they can't come up with the right idea and it would be the same if the contest was twice as long. (Note how I don't recommend prioritizing E as I have a low success rate on div2E, even given a few hours to think of the solution)

    In particular, I'd like to point out that solving ABCD in that order is better than solving DCBA 90% of the time. My advice about starting with D is because it's better to solve CD than ABC due to point distribution: D (almost?) always gives more points than A and B combined. The only reason to skip A and B is if you think solving them will take too much time and prevent you from solving D.

    I wish you a fast recovery :)

    Thanks!! :^)

    Broke my back recently & was taken back from the gym as a result. Know how much this shit sucks

    I think your thing might be a little tiny bit worse than mine... Good luck!

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4 months ago, # |
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Wait until you break your chair

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4 months ago, # |
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I've tried to code with a voice controlled ChatGPT in a div2 VP. I'd told GPT how my ideas about the solution like "sort the array by a_i+b_i" or "do a DP with f[i][j] meaning ...", with those instructions, GPT can quickly write the correct code for me.

In my plan, I should never touched the keyboard myself, but I found the voice recognizer cannot recognize formulas correctly. In the end, I have to write those formulas with my hand to make sure GPT understand me correctly.

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4 months ago, # |
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Hi, estoy-re-sebado! I wish you the best for the Latam Finals! Hope your fingers don't cause you a lot of trouble for you. Regards from UnB!

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    4 months ago, # ^ |
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    Thanks! It was nice meeting at summer school. I hope we can meet again :^)

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4 months ago, # |
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Aron Ralston keeps climbing even he had really lost one of his hand. I believe in your strong strong will, you can make it!

By the way, I have already learnt how to code by feet (and I can use 6 different toes to type now) although it's not polite in public places but sometimes I do it at home when my hands are with hard problems.

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