Szerk
It was more than a hundred years ago that Dániel Arany, a high school teacher from the city of Győr, decided to found a mathematical journal for high school students. His goal was "to give a wealth of examples to students and teachers". The journal's first edition appeared on January 1, 1894.
The foundation of the journal had close connections with the boom in scientific life at the turn of the century. The Mathematical and Physical Society was founded in 1891, and in the autumn of 1894 the first Eötvös Competition in mathematics was organised for students that just graduated from high school.
From that time several generations of mathematicians and scientists developed their problem-solving skills through KöMaL. The best solutions with the names of the 14-18 year-old authors are printed in the periodical.
KöMaL regularly reports on national and international competitions, prints articles on interesting results in mathematics and physics, and includes book reviews.
For more than 40 years all the new problems have appeared in English as well as Hungarian. This means thousands of mathematics and physics problems and exercises in English!
At present the journal is published by the MATFUND Hungarian High School Mathematics and Physics Foundation, the János Bolyai Mathematical Society and the Roland Eötvös Physical Society.
The periodical "KöMaL - Középiskolai Matematikai és Fizikai Lapok" appears in Hungarian language 64 pages a month 9 times a year.
Special issues of KöMaL
We hold contests in mathematics, physics, and computer science.
Our contests have are of difficulty levels, and contestants may compete individually or in teams; details are provided below. The contests run for 9 months, from September 2026 until the beginning of June 2027. New problems are set each month, and contestants may submit their solutions until the beginning of the following month. The final results of the contest will be announced by August 2027 and in the upcoming KöMaL issue in September 2027. Prizes will be presented next autumn at the KöMaL Youth Conference.
We announce contests in mathematics, physics and informatics, altogether in 20 categories with different difficulties. Each contest lasts for 9 months, from September 2025 until the beginning of June 2026; new problems are posted in every month from September to May, and solutions can be submitted before early next month.
1. Fix a positive integer \(\displaystyle n\) and write the numbers \(\displaystyle 0, 1, \ldots, n-1\) on a whiteboard in some order. Two numbers form an inversion if the greater precedes the smaller. A number \(\displaystyle k\) is called special if \(\displaystyle k\) forms inversions with exactly \(\displaystyle k\) other numbers. At most how many special numbers can we have on the board?
