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Puzzle Archive.

Posted: Sun Apr 06, 2008 6:02 pm
by Børge

Re: Puzzle Archive.

Posted: Mon Apr 07, 2008 9:52 pm
by enxio27
Børge wrote: For a limited time my personal Sudoku puzzle archive is public available.
Very nice! Thank you!
Børge wrote: I collect Sudokus from the following three sources:
1) www.samurai-sudoku.com (Monday and Friday).
Out of curiosity, why only Monday and Friday?

Posted: Tue Apr 08, 2008 12:37 am
by JLynn
Why even Monday for that matter? Some Monday Samurai you can pull apart and solve each (or most) individual sudoku separately.

Posted: Tue Apr 08, 2008 7:54 pm
by Børge
Curiosity killed the cat !

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If you are curious and recless, select to read!
This is a service I started about two years ago for some friends of mine, which mostly solve Sudokus using pen and paper. As me, they are all extremely hard working people ;) and only have time to solve one or two Samurais a week. Most of them wanted and still want both a very easy and a very difficult puzzle. If I personally want other days I just rip the Sudoku code of the Internet site and load it into TUSP.

Posted: Wed Apr 09, 2008 7:46 pm
by Pete
I foud a great many of the samuris out there to be the solve any one portion easily ...

Ruuds site is such a change its usually at least 3 passes thru every puzzle
before you can solve one puzzle.
Then 1 or 2 puzzles solved may still not make the others easy.

Ill definately look at those puzzles

Posted: Wed Apr 09, 2008 9:33 pm
by Børge
Pete,
Try some of the Friday samurais from 2006.

Posted: Thu Apr 10, 2008 8:49 pm
by Børge
Pete wrote:I found a great many of the samuris out there to be the solve any one portion easily ...
Pete, you are absolutely right.

But bear in mind that almost all Sudokus found on the Internet are meant to be solved with pen and paper only or a rudimentary online helper (pencil marks at the best, but no highlight etc.), and not an offline solver/helper with fancy visual aids. Hence, except for Ruud, virtually nobody else publishes the Sudoku code.

Many Internet sites have ratings like Fiendish for puzzles that when solved with a good solver/helper aren’t really that difficult. The reason is likely that whoever operates the site wants people to feel good about being able to solve such Sudokus so they come back and visit the site again. Having a high number of visitors makes it easier to earn money from ads and banner clicks. Or they want you to by their often silly Sudoku stuff, like this ridiculous helper or lure you to give them your email address.

The average (and occasional) Sudoku solver is not like "us addicts here" and has little knowledge about the many different solving techniques that exist, except for cross hatching and similar stuff.

One reason that Sudoku has become so popular is that the basic rules are very easy to grasp and that you allegedly get lightly intoxicated when you have solved one, especially when you subjectively think that this was a difficult puzzle. Whenever you in everyday life are able to solve and master a (big) problem, the brain supposedly produces endorphins ("drugs"), which make you feel good and happy. So like regular workout, solving Sudokus could actually be addictive.

I freely admit that when I solve using pen and paper only, I can get into trouble with a puzzle that requires anything more than Naked and Hidden Singles. The reason is that I have to make pencil marks myself and I am not a computer but a human and make mistakes. And then I have to interpret my pencil marks without any visual aids (highlight, etc.)

I am impressed by people who solve Clueless puzzles and Ruud’s Samurais using pen and paper only.