[appleeaters]Idea!

Users dont normally pick the contests, but I think it would be a good idea to have an encrypting contest (of course this would be allot simpler than others). This contest would test the security, efficancy, and the speed of an encrypting program that the contestant makes (the program should have an input box that the user types in a word or phrase and an output that encrypts the input). The winner would have to have the fastest program, with the hardest to crack encryption, and the smallest output (while still being the hardest to crack). This I think would be an easy project to judge, but still be chanllenging to advanced users who want to do very complicated encryptions. Allthough this contest isn't really as advanced as the others, but it still might be good if Matt just wants to do an easier project to grade, and get over with.

How do you judge which is the hardest to crack? Do you employ a cryptologist with a supercomputer?

As I read this, I asked to myself the same question as Matt: HOW ?

oh, well I guess it wouldn't be the easiest to judge nvm

Perhaps we could build on this idea. Instead of encryption, we might strive for a different goal. The one who can encrypt HTML to still render in a non-javascript browser? to render in the newest versions of IE and Netscape? Web page compressor?

As long as we have clear-cut goals, it shouldn't be hard. We could also do the encryption one, but we would probably need to use a specific encryption method, and whomever implements the most efficient routine would win.