Architects Challenged to Create and Document Comprehensive Solutions to a

                         Set of System Requirements



    GLASTONBURY, Conn. and SAN FRANCISCO, Aug. 4 /EMWNews/ --

TopCoder(R), Inc. and Think Services today announced the winner of the

recent Software Architecture Contest held during the Dr. Dobb's

Architecture & Design World 2008, July 21-24 at the Hyatt Regency McCormick

Place in Chicago. Matt Cowan of Chicago won the first prize and Esteban

Porcelli of Livingston, New Jersey took second place in the contest.



    The Software Architecture Contest presented attendees with a real-world

exercise in architectural design to determine who could create and document

the best comprehensive software solution to address a given set of system

requirements within a set timeframe.



    Cowan won an All Access pass to the Dr. Dobb's Event of his choice

including SD Best Practices 2008, SD West 2009 or Dr. Dobb's Architecture &

Design World 2009, while Porcelli earned a 50% discount on the Dr. Dobb's

Event of his choice.



    "The Software Architecture Contest provided an engaging and interactive

experience for our attendees at Architecture & Design World," said Amber

Ankerholz, Conference Manager, Dr. Dobb's Events. "We would like to extend

our congratulations to all of the attendees who participated."



    During Architecture & Design World attendees were asked to create

submissions using the same scorecards and criteria that TopCoder uses to

judge their own commercial software architecture competitions.



    TopCoder tournaments are known worldwide as the most grueling,

comprehensive test of skill in the field of competitive programming. The

events allow competitors to solve complex algorithmic problems and design

and develop working pieces of reusable software, and incorporate all

current industry standard technologies, including Java, C++, C#, VB.NET,

UML, J2EE and .NET.



    "We saw very interesting submissions from our contestants, each of

which used different technologies and different stylistic approaches to the

problem -- from traditional stack builds to cloud type approaches using

Google's App Engine," said Dave Messinger, Chief Architect of TopCoder.

"The winning submission presented a very complete and elegant solution to

the problem set."

    About Dr. Dobb's



    Dr. Dobb's is recognized worldwide as the leading resource for the

professional software development community. With an award-winning monthly

publication (Dr. Dobb's Journal), worldwide technical events and

conferences (Dr. Dobb's Events) and one of the web's most comprehensive

sites (Dr. Dobb's Portal), Dr. Dobb's attracts the industry's most

authoritative audience of professional developers, architects and managers

and provides marketing partners highly actionable integrated marketing

solutions to reach the software development buying team.



    About Think Services



    Think Services connects specialized communities worldwide using

innovative media, educational events, consulting, training and

certification. Providing comprehensive opportunities for people to learn

from, network with, and inspire each other, Think Services builds strong

brands and works within communities to foster a unique affinity with its

products and services. The division's flagship products include the Game

Developers Conference, the Webby Award-winning Gamasutra.com, Game

Developer magazine, the International Customer Management Institute, HDI,

and Dr. Dobb's Journal. Think Services is a subsidiary of United Business

Media, a global provider of news distribution and specialist information

services with a market capitalization of more than $2.5 billion. To learn

more, visit http://www.think-services.com.



    About TopCoder, Inc.



    TopCoder is the world's largest competitive software development

community with over 160,000 developers representing over 200 countries.

TopCoder hosts the largest and most comprehensive developer ratings and

performance metrics available. The TopCoder community builds software for a

wide-ranging client base through a competitive, rigorous, standards based

methodology. This methodology results in a highly consistent set of

software components allowing a software-as-parts approach to application

development. TopCoder makes this large library of software components built

through competition available to all of our clients. Utilizing a world-wide

member base and this library, TopCoder seeks to lower the cost of software

development while increasing both the speed at which applications can be

developed and the quality of the ultimate application. For more information

about sponsoring TopCoder events, recruiting TopCoder members and utilizing

TopCoder's software services, visit http://www.topcoder.com/.



    TopCoder is a registered trademark of TopCoder, Inc. in the United

States and other countries. All other product and company names herein may

be trademarks of their respective owners.






     Jim McKeown

     TopCoder, Inc.

     860.633.5540

     [email protected]



     Jenny Searles

     Dr. Dobb's Events

     415.947.6162

     [email protected]