Question Shard
Each question I devise is designated its own unique identifier deemed a shard. They look like this:
i24f-hr1
s25cu-dq4Format
The shard is a case-insensitive alphanumeric string, with a single hyphen and no whitespace. It comprises several identifying fields:
| field | notes | instance |
|---|---|---|
| Topic | The mathematical topic. | i |
| Year | The year of creation. | 24 |
| Purpose | The context(s) under which the problem was created. | c |
| Hyphen for separating parts of the shard. | - | |
| Initials | Initials relating to an aspect of the problem. | hr |
| Index | An integer for counting shards in case collisions occur. | 1 |
Topic
Each shard is generally assigned a single topic.
| value | meaning | notes |
|---|---|---|
a | arithmetic / algebra | |
e | exponentials / logarithms | |
f | graph drawing | |
i | complex numbers | |
n | number theory / sequences | |
p | combinatorics / probability | |
q | completing the square / quadratic | |
r | geometry | Needs to be ASCII-safe so can’t use π :P |
s | integration | i was taken by complex numbers, unfortunately. |
t | ||
w | ||
o | miscellaneous / other |
Purpose
A question will often have several of these in its shard.
| value | meaning | notes |
|---|---|---|
c | competition / event | |
f | fun | |
p | practice | |
u | unused |