Work on open problems and get results checked
Frontier problems are hard, so start with reruns and cluster tasks, then move to your own claims.
These are open problems: professionals are stuck on them. Your best first wins are reruns of other people's results and ready cluster tasks. They are real contributions, and they teach you the problem fast.
Step 1: Create your free DARC account
Reading is open, but working on problems needs an account. Go to Sign in and choose Continue with Google, Continue with GitHub or Email me a link, whichever you see. There's no password to remember.
You get a public handle (like @ada). Your handle, name and profile picture are public; your email address never is.
Step 2: Find a problem you can actually check
Open Open problems. Filter by field, and in the Any verification menu pick the kind of check you can do: Lean proof, GPU benchmark, Reproduction or Bound / record. The list starts sorted by Most leverage: the problems whose solution would unlock the most.
Start with Reproduction and Lean proof problems: the work is concrete and someone can tell you exactly whether it holds.
Step 3: Read the problem page properly
The problem gives the precise statement and what counts as solved. Path to understanding lists what to read first. How it gets verified names the exact target: the hardware, baseline, metric and tolerance, or the Lean statement.
Then read Bottlenecks and Claims under verification so you know where others are stuck and what's already claimed.
Tip If you can't say in one sentence what would count as solved, read the entries in Path to understanding first.
Step 4: Add what you know
On the problem page, Name a bottleneck and press Post bottleneck when you see a wall others missed, or vote on the ones listed. Grade this problem yourself if you disagree with its grades. Discuss approaches with Comment.
This is cheap, it helps everyone, and it's how others working on the problem find you.
Step 5: Work on it with others in a cluster
Research clusters split a goal into tasks that depend on each other. Open one on your problem, press Join cluster, then Claim a task that's ready.
When you're done, press Complete with your result and its artifacts: a title, a URL and the sha256 of each file, so others can rerun it. A result counts, and unlocks the tasks after it, only once independent members verify it.
No cluster on your problem yet? Press Start a cluster on this problem near the bottom of the problem page: you become its lead and plan the tasks. Starting one locks a refundable deposit of 10 credits.
Step 6: Put your result up for checking
On the problem page, use + add a claim. State exactly what is claimed, cite your sources (paper, repository, logs), and break checking it into steps, like REPRODUCE: rerun the benchmark in §4 or FORMAL: the Lean statement matches Theorem 2. Press Put it on the board.
This locks a refundable deposit of 5 credits (you start with 200). Others verify each check, certified experts settle them, and the field's committee votes on the claim.
Step 7: Check other people's results
Open the Verification board and pick a claim. Each one is broken into checks: rerun this, compare that with the paper, match this Lean statement.
Do one check, then press Submit verification: say what you did, what you found, and link your evidence. If you reran something, paste the sha256 of your output so it can be compared. Reruns are a good first contribution: they need care more than seniority.
Catching an error that someone else then confirms is one of the biggest point awards on the Leaderboard. Most points come from work that someone else confirmed.
Step 8: Make it count for your studies
Ask a professor whether a DARC problem or cluster task could be a course project or a thesis topic. The problems are stated precisely enough to write against.
Your verified work and caught errors show on your public profile, which you can link to.
This page's address saves your answers, so you can bookmark it or send it to someone.