AdventOfCode2018 VS AdventOfCode2019

2018 in Python

This Christmas break I had some time left over and the only year I had left was 2018. I had saved it for last because I had heard many people say it was the most difficult, and boy were they right. I did it in Python to see how it would be to perhaps use it for 2022 and I must say it is really a great language for AoC. Day 23 I think was probably more of the most difficult days of them all for me. I ended up using Z3 which just gave me the answer for free, felt almost like cheating. It also had a few days with a lot of details to get right (15,24) and two difficult reverse-engineering questions.

The field is called "compiler design". Consider taking a course [1] or buying a book?

A somewhat more playful approach might be to complete the 2019 edition of Advent of Code [2], where you'll learn some preliminaries while implementing the Intcode interpreter.

[1] https://online.stanford.edu/courses/soe-ycscs1-compilers

[2] https://adventofcode.com/2019

The ending of Advent of Code 2019 was amazing. Well, the whole season was awesome, but the ending was amazing.

2019 in Rust

This is the seventh year puzzles, if you want to check out previous years take a look at: 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020

I believe this is the direct link to the mentioned challenges: https://adventofcode.com/2019

If you want to get started, I would recommend doing Advent of Code 2019 https://adventofcode.com/2019. It goes through and shows how to implement a basic VM. 0x10c / DCPU-16 is also a good place to start. Such simplified CPU-s help you get started and understand the basics without overwhelming you with the complexity :D.

Overall, I think this year felt a lot easier than the last one. Almost no graph problems, no path finding algorithms, and no insane math problems like day 22, 2019. It's really hard finding the right balance. I think 2019 was maybe a bit too hard and discouraged a lot of people. I like that this year was more approachable but perhaps it was a bit too easy towards the end.

Thanks for an amazing year! Definitely a lot easier this year than last one, which was a bit sad. No hard graph problems, requiring path finding algorithms, no insane math problems like day 22 last year. It's hard finding the right balance. I think 2019 was maybe a bit too hard and this year maybe too easy.