Whose mouse is mightiest? UW code whiz hopes it's his

Some arrive with keyboard and mouse in hand — much like a pool shark arriving at the big match with his own cue. Others put troll figurines atop their computers, Cokes to one side. Online they are known by names like "Soultaker" and "Blackmath."

Knuckles crack. It's competition time.

Creating fast and flawless computer programs may not sound like a competitive spectator sport. But when University of Washington senior Michael Skinner takes on other top college computer programmers from around the world in Florida today, there will be $260,000 total prize money at stake, and observers watching competitors' every keystroke on large plasma screens.

Think "Star Trek" convention meets World Series of Poker.

Skinner, 22, who is better known in this world by his online handle "Paranoia," carries national pride on his back. He's one of only two Americans to make the final 120 competitors in the 2007 TopCoder Collegiate Challenge. The other is Yui Yo Ho, a University of Central Florida computer-science student.

The contestants will compete in one of five categories. Skinner and seven other finalists in the "marathon match" category will be given a problem and eight hours to come up with the best solution. First prize wins $15,000. Past TopCoder problems have included plotting a route for a spaceship through a galaxy of moving stars and asteroids, and finding the best way to place advertisements among clusters of people. Companies sometimes pay to get real problems solved.

Participants write hundreds of lines of computer code to best accomplish their tasks. The key lies in creating elegant and sophisticated mathematical algorithms, or problem-solving procedures.

TopCoder is a private company that makes money by selling some of the finished code and matching employers with contestants. The competition is also sponsored by pharmaceutical company Eli Lilly, Deutsche Bank and the National Security Agency — which states on the competition Web site that it wants to employ U.S. citizens to help break ciphers.

Skinner, who grew up in Montana, considers himself lucky because his parents were behind the technology curve. They owned an ancient computer that didn't have a hard drive — instead they would boot it up using floppy disks. To use that computer, Skinner needed to learn text commands.

At age 8, when his family moved to Sammamish, Skinner was already using computers. By age 10, he was writing programs. He remembers that one of his first tested users on their math skills by posing multiplication or addition questions.

These days, he can converse in five languages — computer languages, that is. C++ is his code of choice. And yes, he has already been recruited, by Google. He plans to start working at the company's Kirkland office next fall, after finishing his computer-science degree and traveling in Europe.

He said it's crucial to know all the maddening details of computer syntax ahead of time. And it's important to devise a game plan before starting to write code, then to pay attention to little details along the way. He particularly relishes probability questions.

But Skinner finds his dedication can get too intense.

"The trouble I find with my girlfriend is that, every now and again, I will think about a problem too hard and I won't hear what she's saying," he said.

Skinner has excelled in other competitions as well. He will be on the top UW team in another regional competition Nov. 10. Stuart Reges, a senior lecturer in computer science at the UW, said he has high hopes that team might make it to the world finals.

"Michael is particularly fast at solving problems, and that helps in contests," Reges said. "It takes a lot of practice to do well. And he has been practicing."

But Skinner will face tough competition in Florida — including students from Poland and France who placed at the TopCoder open competition earlier this year, and another from the United Kingdom who won a recent elimination round.

Mike Lydon, the chief technology officer of TopCoder, said Americans once dominated the competition. He said he doesn't think the U.S. is degenerating in computer science but rather that other countries have embraced the competition aspect more wholeheartedly.

"But it is clear that the borders are disappearing, especially when it comes to software development," Lydon said. "In order for U.S. developers to remain competitive, and for us to remain competitive as a country, education needs to get much more focused on computer science at middle school and high school."

Nick Perry: 206-515-5639 or nperry@seattletimes.com