I'm running the ICFP programming contest (2026)

The 29th annual ICFP Programming Contest began on July 24, 2026, designed by Frank Chiarulli, Henry Nelson, Eliot Hedeman, and the author to address AI agent challenges by introducing a new language called "littleman" that emphasizes spatial reasoning. The contest runs for 72 hours, and participants can sign up at icfpcontest2026.com, with a free textbook available for the littleman language.

I'm running a programming contest It started an hour ago Jul 24, 2026 I’ve spent the last few months working with my friends Frank https://www.frankchiarulli.com/ , Henry https://github.com/hcnelson99 , and Eliot https://github.com/eliothedeman to design the 29th annual ICFP Programming Contest https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ICFP Programming Contest . The contest began an hour ago I meant to mention this sooner, sorry and runs for 3 days. If you’d like, you can sign up at icfpcontest2026.com https://icfpcontest2026.com/ . Of course, we spent a lot of time thinking about how to design a fun programming contest in the age of AI agents. It would not be satisfying if the winning strategy for the contest was to run an unmonitored agent in a loop for 72 hours. a simple program in the littleman language So for the contest we’ve designed a new language we call “littleman.” Littleman programs are two dimensional and place a heavy emphasis on spatial reasoning - your little men must physically walk over instructions to execute them, and they exchange data with “pipes” that you draw in your program’s source code. We’ve written a textbook about the littleman programming language https://icfpcontest2026.com/textbook . It’s open to everyone, so you can check it out even if you’re not registered for the contest. Enjoy