Call for Tasks

The Southeast Asia Team Selection Test (SEATST) is an online IOI-like competition mainly for the South East Asia region. SEATST 2026 will be held on TBD. The scientific committee of SEATST invites everyone in the programming competitions community to submit tasks for the SEATST 2026 competition. Guidelines for tasks and instructions for submission are given below.

SEATST Competition Tasks

SEATST tasks are similar to the tasks in International Olympiad in Informatics (IOI), which are typically focused on the design of efficient, correct algorithms. Input and output are to be kept as simple as possible.

The guidelines of task preparations of IOI should be considered, with no restriction. The documents about submission of IOI tasks, which can be used as reference to create the tasks, can be found on the IOI website.

The submission of novel tasks types not yet seen in any recent programming competitions is encouraged.

To ensure a fair and interesting competition for all, tasks should satisfy the following conditions:

• The tasks should not have been seen by any potential SEATST 2026 competitors.
• The tasks should not have been used in any similar competition.
• The tasks should be solvable by SEATST competitors during an SEATST competition round.
• The task descriptions should be unambiguous and easy to understand.
• The tasks should be culturally neutral.
• The tasks should be innovative.

Difficulty & Style

The difficulty of the SEATST contest should be significantly easier than IOI. The contest only need to be challenging enough to clearly separate each delegation’s top four from the rest. In principle, it is acceptable if those top four achieve full scores.

As SEATST is a team selection test, we also welcome problems with a more classical flavor than typical IOI tasks. However, tasks should still not be a direct application of a classical technique.

What to Submit?

A task submission must contain:

• Statement in English, preferably formatted in PDF with required diagrams and pictures included.
• Description of the desired solution (a description of an algorithm which should get full score).
• At least one implementation of the desired solution in C++.
• Contact (preferably discord handle and e-mail address) and background information on the task author(s): affiliation, country, and a description of the author’s role in the IOI team selection process or national olympiad, including training duties, over the period from IOI 2025 to IOI 2026.

It is also strongly recommended to contain:

• Analyses of alternative solutions.
• Suggestions for grading.
• Test data or ideas for generating test data.
• The motivation behind the task.

Any comments related to the task are also welcome and would be highly appreciated. Submitted tasks must be kept in strict confidence until the end of SEATST 2026.

NOTES:

Please note that all material submitted becomes the property of the SEATST community, and that by submitting the author is assigning the Copyright and all rights to the submitted materials to the SEATST community.

Note that we do not wish to forbid authors of submitted tasks to be involved in other competitions and training, but we do ask them to take all necessary precautions to safeguard confidentiality.

Submitted tasks, including the description and test cases, may be subject to modifications by the scientific committee.

Submission Process

Task materials must be placed together in a single file (use .zip for multiple files). Email to sc.seatst@gmail.com with [Task Submission] - <task title> as the subject and attach the task submission.

The submission deadline is 15 February 2026, 23:59 GMT+8.

Task Selection Process

• Tasks that are not used will be kept secret, and will be returned to their submitter so that they can be used elsewhere.
• All submitted tasks will be seen only by the SEATST scientific committee.
• At various moments during the preparation of the SEATST 2026 competition, it is possible that submitted tasks are dropped from further consideration. However, it may still be necessary to revert such decisions later.
• In general, all submitted tasks, whether dropped or not, should be kept secret until the end of competition.
• Authors of submitted tasks will be recognized on the SEATST website by listing their name, affiliation, and country (unless they specifically decline this).
• Each problem that’s actually used in the competition will be rewarded with 500 SGD after the end of the event.

Communication on Discord

Authors may opt in to a private SEATST Discord server for quicker clarifications and coordination with the Scientific Committee. To join, include your Discord handle in the submission email.

Authors may additionally assist in task preparation for an additional reward of up to 300 SGD.