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chapter-00.1-about-softuni.md

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+# About Software University (SoftUni)
+
+[The Software University (SoftUni)](https://softuni.org) is **the largest training center for software engineers in South-Eastern Europe**. Tens of thousands of students pass through the university every year. SoftUni was founded in 2014 as a continuation of the hard work of [**Dr. Svetlin Nakov**](https://nakov.com) in training **skillful software engineering professionals** by a practical, contemporary and high-quality education that combines fundamental knowledge with modern software technologies and a lot of practice.
+
+## SoftUni: High-quality Practical Tech Education
+
+The Software University provides **quality education**, **profession**, **job** and **diploma** for programmers, software engineers and IT professionals. SoftUni builds an extremely successful and strong **connection between education and industry** by collaborating with hundreds of software companies, provides job and internships of its students, creates quality professionals for the software industry, and directly responds to the needs of employers via the training process.
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+<!-- to update -->
+<!-- ### Free Programming Courses at SoftUni
+
+SoftUni organizes **free programming courses for beginners**: online and on-site in few locations. The purpose is to give a chance to **everyone interested** in programming and technologies to **try programming**, checks if they are interested and if they would get seriously involved in software development. You can sign up for [Software Developer program  at SoftUni](https://learn.softuni.org/catalog?utm_source=FreeProgrammingBooks&utm_medium=text&utm_campaign=JavaBook).
+The free programming basics courses at SoftUni aim to introduce you to **basic programming constructions** in the software development world, that you can use in any programming language. These include working with **data**, **variables** and **expressions**, using **conditional statements**, constructing **loops**, defining and calling **methods** and other approaches for building programming logic. The trainings are **highly practically oriented**, which means that **the emphasis is strongly on exercises**, and you get the opportunity to apply your knowledge during the learning process.
+This **programming book** accompanies the free programming lessons for beginners at SoftUni and serves as an additional teaching aid to help the learning process. -->
+
+## The SoftUni Interactive Classroom
+
+SoftUni’s self-paced programs teach software developers worldwide in the innovative **Interactive Classroom** that combines **video lessons, coding sessions, examples, and exercises** in a single platform on the Web.
+
+Using the **SoftUni Interactive Platform**, you **write, execute and test code directly into the browser** and your exercise solutions are automatically evaluated by the integrated **Judge system**. If you have difficulties with an assignment, you can **get assistance** in multiple ways: with automated hints and guidelines or through SoftUni’s **help center**. Try it now with a [**7-day free trial**](https://learn.softuni.org/catalog?utm_source=FreeProgrammingBooks&utm_medium=text&utm_campaign=C%23Book).
+
+This is how the **SoftUni Interactive Classroom** looks like:
+ 
+![](/assets/chapter-0-images/SoftUni-Interactive-Classroom-Video.png)
+
+![](/assets/chapter-0-images/SoftUni-Interactive-Classroom-Live-Coding-Exercise.png)
+
+## The Automated Judge System
+
+**The SoftUni Judge system** \([https://judge.softuni.org](https://judge.softuni.org)\) is an automated Internet system for **checking the solutions of programming exercises via series of tests**. The submission and verification happen in **real time**: you submit the solution and within seconds you get an answer whether it is correct. You earn points for each task depending on your answer. For a completely right one, you get the maximum points for the problem. With a partially correct solution, you receive a fraction of the points. And with a completely wrong answer, you get 0 points. This how the **SoftUni Judge** looks like:![](/assets/chapter-1-images/02.Expression-03.png)
+
+**All problems from the current book are available for testing in SoftUni Judge** and we strongly recommend testing them after you solve them to be sure you don't miss anything and that your solution works correctly according to the task requirements.
+
+Keep in mind some **specifics about SoftUni Judge**:
+
+* For each task the **Judge system keeps the best score you had**. Therefore, if you upload a solution with wrong code or lower score compared to the previous one, the system won't take away your points.
+* The output of your program is **compared** by the system to a strictly expected result. Every **unnecessary symbol, missing comma or space** may lead to 0 points on a particular test. The **output** that the Judge system expects is **described in the requirements of every task** and **nothing else should be added**. 
+* **Example:** If the output requires to print a number \(ex. `25`\), do not display any descriptive messages such as `The result is: 25`, just print as it is required, i.e. only the number.
+
+The SoftUni Judge system is **available any time** via its website: [https://judge.softuni.org](https://judge.softuni.org).
+
+  * Using the SoftUni system is **free** and it's not bound with the participation in SoftUni's courses.
+
+We are convinced that after sending a few tasks **you will like getting instant feedback** for your solutions and the Judge system will become your favorite assistant in your programming practice.