Editorial for COCI '08 Contest 1 #1 Skocimis

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Suppose kangaroo $A$ ~A~ is farther from $B$ ~B~ than $B$ ~B~ is from $C$ ~C~. Then the three kangaroos will play longest if $C$ ~C~ jumps first, onto position $A+1$ ~A+1~ or $B-1$ ~B-1~. They can repeat this until they are standing next to each other.

The total number of jumps will be $B-A-1$ ~B-A-1~ or $C-B-1$ ~C-B-1~, depending on which pair of kangaroos was initially farther. The solution is the value of the expression $\max\{B-A, C-B\} - 1$ ~\max\{B-A, C-B\} - 1~.

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