Supernova Tic Tac Toe + CP Engine
A coding arena on 22 machines, where solving a problem buys you a move in Tic Tac Toe.
The problem
The event needed a real judge, not a quiz form. That means compiling submitted code safely, enforcing time and memory limits, and returning a verdict fast enough that nobody notices the wait, for a hall full of students hitting submit in the same minute.
What we built
We built it as a physical distributed system across 22 lab PCs. One machine ran the main server, one ran Redis, one ran PostgreSQL, and the rest were workers that compiled and executed submissions under full constraints. Responses came back in milliseconds. The game sat on top of the judge: solve a problem, earn a move on the board. Load testing with k6 put the whole thing at around 3,000 to 4,000 requests per second.
- 22-PC cluster: main server, Redis, PostgreSQL, and the rest as compile workers
- Submissions compiled and judged under constraints, answered in milliseconds
- Game loop where correct solutions unlock Tic Tac Toe moves for 100+ live players
- Load tested at roughly 3,000 to 4,000 requests per second with k6
My contribution
What I owned on the team
Event coordinator and full-stack developer. I ran the operations side of the event and built the platform the participants competed on.
How it turned out
It ran through all three rounds at Supernova with 100+ participants on it, and nothing fell over. Building software and then standing in the room while people use it teaches you things a localhost demo cannot.