LinuxProgramming.com: Lander1: Houston, We Have a Bug

Thanks to Thomas Kunert, a bug in the Lander1 simulation code
has been discovered and fixed.

The problem is that upon landing successfully, some of the
ship’s status variables won’t be updated. Since one of the
variables in question is the remaining fuel weight of the ship,
this affects the scoring, and had to be fixed. I suspect that this
will not make any significant difference to anyone’s score or their
entry, but it’s only fair to let people know about the change and
have a fair chance to respond to it.

• Here’s how we’ll handle this situation:
• A new copy of lander.tar.gz
  has already been uploaded with the source code fix. (The fix is a
  one-liner, the removal of a “return” statement in the update()
  function right after line 161.)
• All contestants who have submitted an entry will be notified by
  e-mail of the change, and advised to download a new copy of the
  source code so they can check their entry and, at their option,
  submit an updated version.
• If a contestant does not supply a new entry by the contest
  deadline (April 2, 2001), the person’s original entry will be
  used.
• If the contestant does supply a new entry, then the prior one
  will be discarded and the new one will be used, but with the entry
  date and time of the original. Because this is a bug in the
  simulation code, we don’t feel it would be fair to penalize
  contestants for something that wasn’t their fault.

Take care,
Lou Grinzo
Editor, LinuxProgramming.com