The New Sudoku Players' Forum

[ohho]

Dear all,

I have just finished a Sudoku app and want to bundle some puzzles with it. I am look for puzzles of 3 categories:

- Easy ones for novice
- Intermediate
- Hard for advanced players

Hopefully 250 puzzles of each category will be great.

BTW, are the Minimum Sudoku puzzles too hard for human players?

[enxio27]

I hope you realize that puzzle makers aren't going to supply puzzles to you for free so that you can sell them with an app. And the puzzles you find on the Internet can't be used commercially without permission of the copyright holder.

[m_b_metcalf]

I have just finished a Sudoku app and want to bundle some puzzles with it. I am look for puzzles of 3 categories:

- Easy ones for novice
- Intermediate
- Hard for advanced players

Hopefully 250 puzzles of each category will be great.

I'll sell you about 4000 graded from 1.2 to 11+ for a token $1000.

BTW, are the Minimum Sudoku puzzles too hard for human players?

No, 80% are very easy.

Regards,

Mike Metcalf

[Pat]

BTW, are the Minimum Sudoku puzzles too hard for human players?

No, 80% are very easy.

a few of them are tougher

if ohho can't grade them,
he can't tell which of them are easy

[ohho]

I hope you realize that puzzle makers aren't going to supply puzzles to you for free so that you can sell them with an app. And the puzzles you find on the Internet can't be used commercially without permission of the copyright holder.

I am looking for public domain (or creative common license) puzzles like those on magictour.free.fr. It seems to me most are hard puzzles though.

[enxio27]

I am looking for public domain (or creative common license) puzzles like those on magictour.free.fr.

You are mistaken (as is that site's author) that all of the puzzles on that site are in the public domain. (There's a good reason that site is so outdated.) It's highly unlikely that you will find collections of puzzles that have been placed into the public domain by their creators, although some (such as Gordon Royle's Minimum Sudoku Collection) may have been released under a CCL. Another difficulty is that many puzzle sites, books, etc. contain numerous puzzles that are invalid (multiple solutions, etc.)

Instead of taking someone else's puzzles, why don't you write your app to generate its own puzzles and determine their validity and difficulty? Alternatively, you could write the app to allow the user to import their own puzzle collections (in standard 81-character-per-line format).

Incidentally, what does your app offer that currently available apps do not? For what platform is this app written?

[ohho]

I am looking for public domain (or creative common license) puzzles like those on magictour.free.fr.

You are mistaken (as is that site's author) that all of the puzzles on that site are in the public domain. (There's a good reason that site is so outdated.) It's highly unlikely that you will find collections of puzzles that have been placed into the public domain by their creators, although some (such as Gordon Royle's Minimum Sudoku Collection) may have been released under a CCL. Another difficulty is that many puzzle sites, books, etc. contain numerous puzzles that are invalid (multiple solutions, etc.)

Instead of taking someone else's puzzles, why don't you write your app to generate its own puzzles and determine their validity and difficulty? Alternatively, you could write the app to allow the user to import their own puzzle collections (in standard 81-character-per-line format).

Incidentally, what does your app offer that currently available apps do not? For what platform is this app written?

Thanks very much for your kindly information.

I am trying to avoid duplicated effort if there is prior work. Option to importing puzzles is a feature. However, I'd like to provide a bit of convenience for novices (assuming gamers who know how to collect puzzles are already experienced players ;-)

I prefer minimal UI. You may see my previous work, for example:

https://itunes.apple.com/app/qipan-a-sgf-reader/id691029036?mt=8
https://itunes.apple.com/app/minimalist-timer/id487145086?mt=8

My Sudoku app will follow a similar approach.

[enxio27]

I am trying to avoid duplicated effort if there is prior work.

Well, there are already an awful lot of sudoku apps out there (including one by our esteemed admin, Jason Linhart, called Sudoku). Most of them aren't worth the download. (Jason's definitely is.) Many suffer from "invalid puzzle syndrome". Have you reviewed the existing offerings to make sure yours is unique enough to not get lost in the shuffle?

I prefer minimal UI.

That's good. I like minimal, as long as the UI does what it needs to without getting in the user's way.

You may see my previous work, for example:

Unfortunately, I don't do iThings, so I can't try them out. I'm an Android user myself.

Before you start looking for puzzle collections for your app, you yourself must be a sudoku solver and enthusiast. If you are not, then you are likely wasting your time with a sudoku app because you won't understand the needs and desires of your users. Secondly, you need to be able to rate the difficulty of each puzzle with some consistency and accuracy for your puzzles to have any value to your users. I'll leave it to others here to suggest the best one(s) to use.

[dobrichev]

Hi ohho & welcome to the forum.

You asked for collection of puzzles that are solvable by average sudoku player. Such puzzles are very easy to generate. Claiming ownership on a puzzle that has nothing special and could be generated in microseconds by some stupid software is absurd to me. If you have no depth knowledge in sudoku, and don't want to learn but prefer to reuse someone else's work, it is OK. But then, as enxio27 mentioned, your application has zero chances to attract users that are interested in sudoku. If your application is targeted to users that are not much interested in sudoku, you have still chances, say, by making an application that progressively strips a girl after fixing any cell value. An ugly girl for the easy level of course.

Answering your question, you may look at Patterns Game Results topic in this forum. Here you will find rated puzzles that have unique solution and no redundant clues. Feel free to use the puzzles posted by me. Find the rating margins that best map to your concept of hardness. Obtaining details how the puzzles are rated I am leaving to you.

[ohho]

Hi ohho & welcome to the forum.

You asked for collection of puzzles that are solvable by average sudoku player. Such puzzles are very easy to generate. Claiming ownership on a puzzle that has nothing special and could be generated in microseconds by some stupid software is absurd to me. If you have no depth knowledge in sudoku, and don't want to learn but prefer to reuse someone else's work, it is OK. But then, as enxio27 mentioned, your application has zero chances to attract users that are interested in sudoku. If your application is targeted to users that are not much interested in sudoku, you have still chances, say, by making an application that progressively strips a girl after fixing any cell value. An ugly girl for the easy level of course.

Answering your question, you may look at Patterns Game Results topic in this forum. Here you will find rated puzzles that have unique solution and no redundant clues. Feel free to use the puzzles posted by me. Find the rating margins that best map to your concept of hardness. Obtaining details how the puzzles are rated I am leaving to you.

Thanks very much for your sudoku puzzles. I'd definitely include some in my app. Thanks!