Su|Do|Ku
Sudoku never really caught my interest until today morning, when the power went out and I had no other means of entertainment. I picked up today’s paper and managed to solve the puzzle. Intrigued, I went to the paper heap and dug out the older papers and began solving all the Sudoku puzzles.
That’s when it struck me, why not create a software to solve these puzzles? Sure, there are millions of sudoku puzzle solvers out on the net already, but the programming challenge that it provided was too great to pass up. By the time the power came back, I had a basic layout in mind for the program.
Now I have completed the program, which is capable of solving puzzles of levels 2 to 5, that is, puzzles with 2×2 boxes (easiest) upto 5×5 boxes (hardest) by determing which number can go to each cell. I managed to verify the output of some of the puzzles with what I had solved by hand. It still can’t solve those very hard puzzles yet, and I’m looking for a way to implement that section.
June 26th, 2005 at 10:34 am
So this is how programmers have fun?
June 26th, 2005 at 11:31 am
Is a Su-do-ku - any different from a normal crossword - or what is it made of?
Great work on the program though - planning to GPL it?
June 26th, 2005 at 1:46 pm
curses: Yeah!!!
Sat: Check out the site http://www.sudoku.com/ for details on the puzzle. Regarding the program, I haven’t decided whether to put it in the public domain, GPL it or license it differently…
June 27th, 2005 at 7:33 am
Question is, is there a market for it. The point about Sudoku is that you, as in a human solves it. Why would I buy a piece of code to solve it. Unless I was stupid, which I am. Hey, how much do you want for it?
June 27th, 2005 at 10:48 am
Ravages: I’ve not released the code yet, so there’s no question of wanting stuff for it. Besides, it’s still pretty crude and slow. Just a matter of time…
July 1st, 2005 at 5:37 pm
And I have finally realized that the code which I wrote was completely wrong. It’s capable of solving The Hindu’s puzzles, that’s it…