5 things you need to know if you are participating in a developer competition

This is not the first year that we have been holding the Imagine Cup competition. IC is a system of international competitions for students of technical specialties. The closest acceptance of applications for participation in the main competition of software projects closes on February 15, and a lot of questions have already accumulated for it. In the topic, I will try to explain why these contests are needed for students in general, how exactly they help in life, what needs to be done to win and what mistakes the participants most often make.

About the competition in general

The Imagine Cup is the largest IT and programming competition in the world for the tenth time this year. The usual number of participants is about 300 thousand people from 70 countries. Three Russian teams entered the last year’s international final in New York; in 2008, the Russian RedDevils team took first place in the Project Hoshimi category, in 2009 - Viva took second place in Software Design, in 2010 - Robonyanya team won second place in Embedded Development.

The first advice is to download brochures describing past projects and watch recordings of successful projects (finalists of the international stage of Software Design: Jordan , New Zealand , USA , China ,Ireland and Romania ) to better understand the essence of the contest and appreciate the variety of projects. (If you find something complicated, don’t be afraid, it always starts with small steps - submitting an application, gathering a team and the first prototypes.)

Various competitions are held as part of the competition: this can be development for a specific technology (for example, projects using Kinect game development or mobile application development). The main competition is software projects where teams of students or graduate students compete.

What do you need to participate in the main competition?

1. To come up with the idea of ​​any software product that uses Microsoft technology. This may seem like a severe limitation, but actually it is not - the requirements for MS technologies are quite loyal and provide a wide choice, and you can always use other technologies you need in your project. For example, you can write software for any mobile platform where the server part is spinning on one of the Microsoft solutions.

2. Assemble a team of up to 4 students and a leader. A teacher, a graduate student, or a person from the side often acts as a leader - he does not have to work in the education system. You can create a group without a leader.

3. Submit an application with this idea for the competition. This year you need to do it quickly - there are only a few days left before the competition. The application itself should contain just a general text description of the idea (with the architecture of the software solution). A prototype and presentation will be required only after a month, that is, even if you have just heard about the contest for the first time, you can participate.

Where to see the whole list of contests and deadlines for applications

On the official website of the competition www.imaginecup.com in the COMPETE section you can find all competitions with detailed formal rules in English. Most contests are also written on the Microsoft student blog (http://blogs.msdn.com/rustudents).

How to apply

The theme of the contest is "Imagine a world in which technology helps solve the most complex problems of our time." You can focus on the so-called. Millennium Goals proposed by the UN, but not required. You can offer a solution to a global problem, as well as an important local one, relevant for a relatively small group of people.

Second tip : Imagine Cup is not a startup competition, although if your project has plans for commercialization, that's good too. The essence of the competition is to show that you can “squeeze” out of technology in real life (you can consider this as a proof of concept), and not then to make a business out of it (although I repeat, if this can be done, it’s good - you will have an additional incentive). Turning to the list of winners - last year, for example, there was a project where, with the help of Kinect and augmented reality, the user was helped to add origami. Time will tell what will come of this in the future, but today it is rather a PoC of technological opportunity.

You can apply for this contest until February 15, for other thematic ones - there are still a couple of weeks to think.

What will happen next?

Then the places of regional finals will be determined. If a dozen applications come from your city at once, the jury will gather on the spot. If one application is submitted from the city, this does not mean an automatic regional victory - an invitation will be sent to another region. Presumably, judging by the dynamics of applications, this year it will be Moscow, St. Petersburg, Saratov, Tomsk, Perm. It will be possible to say exactly after February 15th.

After that - the final in Moscow. There are regional winners. From the final of the country, the team goes to the international final, which takes place in a new place every year. This time he will be in Sydney.

What do you need to pass the regional finals?

Third tip : do not invest 100% in the prototype. Here you can see the criteria for evaluating the project. Please note that mainly three things are evaluated (as in real business): competent architecture, presentation skills and idea. From 20 minutes of the presentation, the prototype will be shown 5-7 minutes: the rest of the time will be devoted to describing the need for such a solution and detailing the architecture.

The winners are mainly projects with some wow component: perhaps not the most technologically advanced of all, but they definitely bring something new and useful to our reality.

Do I need to participate at all?

Fourth tip : if there is at least some idea - yes, you must participate. In fact, filling out an application with all the details takes no more than half an hour, that is, in a day you can assemble a team and state an idea. This is important for this reason: firstly, many participants get an excellent entry in the resume: it is quoted both in Microsoft and in other software companies. Secondly, the competition is a real communication with people who understand the needs of the sphere: here you can establish business contacts. Thirdly, the competition teaches teamwork: after it, the same team can easily take on a commercial project. There are examples of such cases after the competition, when projects were implemented: for example, in 2009, a project on forecasting the development of fires took a good position, it was later put into practice.

What ideas are more likely to succeed?

Over the past years, the standard approach has been to look at the UN Millennium Challenge List (see link above). In almost every competition there are some projects related to medicine and something social: such projects are traditionally a little better perceived. Nevertheless, again, the main thing in the idea is the opportunity to show some little magic that makes life easier due to technology.

Where to write?

Fifth tip : if you have questions, it’s not too late to come to the Imagine Cup Student Camp in St. Petersburg , a similar event in Moscow has already passed), there you can recruit a team and find ideas. Different answers to subtle questions can be found in the question-answer virtual session recording available here (http://www.techdays.ru/videos/4118.html). Or ask questions here, or, if you are just reading, on Twitter, to my colleague Dmitry Soshnikov .