The International Obfuscated C Code Contest (IOCCC29) is in "pending state," meaning the contest is open for you to register:
https://www.ioccc.org/next/register.html
Feel free to register today, even if you are not sure if you want to enter, instead of waiting until the last minute near the contest deadline.
On 2025 December 14th at 23:00 UTC, there will be an IOCCC Discord hangout to discuss IOCCC29. To join the IOCCC Discord server:
"The Bourne shell code, along with the 4.2BSD finger implementation, was the impetus for the International Obfuscated C Code Contest." #ioccc #bsd
research.swtch.com/shmacro
research!rsc: Bourne Shell Mac...
We have published a video on the IOCCC Patreon talking about the IOCCC29 contest as well as some of the more important changes to the rules and guidelines:
The IOCCC29 will run from 2025-12-03 20:25:12.045045 UTC to 2026-03-13 17:19:23.293137 UTC.
This contest will enter the pending state on 2025-12-03 20:25:12.045045 UTC, allowing people to register for the IOCCC:
https://www.ioccc.org/next/register.html
Rules & Guideline feedback welcome:
https://www.ioccc.org/faq.html#feedback
This contest will enter the open state on 2025-12-15 18:21:24.273033 UTC, allowing people to upload submissions.
For how to enter the IOCCC:
We have made great progress on getting ready for IOCCC29 ‼️
The mkiocccentry toolkit is now code complete and under a feature freeze.
Fixed minor nits and minor bugs in the Rules, Guidelines, and FAQ and www.ioccc.org website.
IOCCC winner repo and www.ioccc.org website have been revised.
Submit server and backend servers have undergone "IOCCC29-like" testing.
Please download, compile, and test the mkiocccentry toolkit:
https://github.com/ioccc-src/mkiocccentry
We have published an update on our progress towards opening the next C contest known as IOCCC29:
This video is available for both free and paid patrons for who we continue to thank as they provide the funds needed for the servers, services and software necessary to run the contest as well as to support our YouTube producer.
Hello friends and fans of the IOCCC!
We posted a free update video on our Patreon feed:
about the checkpoint on the table driven walk code.
Stay tuned as we continue to make good progress towards starting IOCCC29!
I didn't know I was writing competition quality code the whole time. (err) #IOCCC
For our patrons over on Patreon, we have uploaded a video talking about our the schedule for IOCCC29:
The general public can watch the first 30 seconds. Patreon, including free Patreon members should be able to watch the whole thing.
We also discuss some of the changes being planned for the Rules and Guidelines rewrite as well as changes that are being make to the mkiocccentry toolkit.
TL;DR: Our plan is to start IOCCC29 in December 2025.
The International Obfuscated C Code Contest thanks Thomas Cort, GitHub user tcort:
for becoming a GitHub sponsor of the IOCCC!
Running and maintaining the contest involves real-world costs.
Thomas Cort's voluntary contributions directly empower us to cover these essential operational expenses: helping us to pay for the servers, services, and software as well as to pay for Our Favorite Universe show producer.
Thank you, Thomas!
@duke_of_germany If you're looking for a challenge and testing your understanding of #C, then the winners of #IOCCC are worth exploring.
We would have had to determine if there was going to be a “Best of Show” prize, or a “Most well Rounded” prize.
The criteria for both are slightly different. So for a while, until we selected which type of prize was going to be given out, we might have had to do scoring for both types of prizes.
So rather than giving out one (or maybe both?) though a long judging process with an uncertain outcome do the score MoE being larger than the gaps, we chose to not give such a prize.
Leo would have his nonminations, w/some overlap. The union would be as long as the usual number of IOCCC wining entries!
It would have required a number of scoring rounds as well as focusing on those with a wide divergence score. After many rounds our scores would have converged in some rank list.
We would have to pick just one for the “Most well rounded” / “Best of Show” prize. Worse, the “margin of error” for scores would have been larger than gaps amongst the top scores.
We decided to NOT have a “Most well rounded” prize. If we had, I would have nominated:
- 2024/cable1
- 2024/carlini
- 2024/codemeow
- 2024/endoh1
- 2024/endoh2
- 2024/ferguson2
- 2024/howe
- 2024/kurdyukov1
- 2024/kurdyukov4
- 2024/macke
- 2024/mills
- 2024/tmarrec
- 2024/tompng
There’s nothing wrong with any 2024 entries NOT listed above: ALL of them are WINNERS!
I only speak for myself: thus, this is NOT official.
QUESTION TO ANYONE: Which winners would you have nominated?
全球最古老程序员赛事回归！晦涩C代码大战AI！750字节手搓一个推理引擎，评委：被瑞克滚了！人类比AI厉害，程序员的快乐回来了！
https://mp.weixin.qq.com/s/KAzg6rtfYNV5xz_o0cp-bg
