The New Sudoku Players' Forum

[Christer]

From today´s Sydsvenska Dagbladet ”Dagens Sudoko” we have the following startposition:

.2. 618 .4.
7.. ... ..8
..8 ... 9..

.3. 1.7 .5.
... ... ...
.4. 3.5 .1.

..2 ... 6..
4.. ... ..5
.7. 963 .2.

We have made reductions to the following position ( any mistake?):

3/9,2,3/9 6,1,8 5,4,7
7,1/5/6,4 2/5,2/3/5,9 2/1,3/6,8
1/5/6,1/5/6,8 2/4/5/7,2/3/4/5/7,2/4 9,3/6,1/2

2/6/8/9,3,6/9 1,2/4/8/9,7 2/4/8,5,2/4/6/9
1/2/5/8/9,1/5/8/9,1/5/7/9 2/4/8,2/4/8/9,6 2/3/4/7/8,7/8/9,2/3/4/9
2/6/8/9,4,6/7/9 3,2/8/9,5 2/7/8,1,2/6/9

1/3/5/8/9,1/8/9,2 4/5/7/8,4/5/7/8,1/4 6,7/8/9,1/3/9
4,1/6/8/9,1/3/6/9 2/7/8,2/7/8,1/2 1/3/7/8,7/8/9,5
1/5/8,7,1/5 9,6,3 1/4/8,2,1/4

We can´t find next step of reduction! Anyone who can help?

[PaulIQ164]

It's a very poor puzzle for a newspaper. Sudoku Susser can only solve it with something called 'Trebor's Tables', and it takes it a while to manage even that (in its words: "you'd go through a lot of pencils working it out by hand"). So as far as people doing it in a newspaper are concerned, I think it's unsolveable without using trial and error (I think).

PS: I tried running Susser on it without Trebor's Tables allowed, and it crashed it!

[Christer]

Thank´s for your support Paul - a trial and error on the r1-pair of 3/9 helps a lot.

Christer and Annika

[Anette]

According an article in the newspaper Sydsvenska Dagbladet (July 2nd), their Sudokus are Pappocom, provided to them from a communication bureau (Jeffery and Edling) who also provide sudokus to other Swedish Newspapers.

So probably there has been a typo somewhere along the line.

[PaulIQ164]

That would seem odd though, considering the puzzle is symmetrical and does only have one solution - you'dhave to get a pretty (un)lucky typo for that to work. I think this "communication bureau" is a bit suspect...

[Anette]

The article says that the communication bureau use a program that is based on the Pappocom way of creating sudokus.

I've never seen their name in any other Swedish sudokus, although the article says that they provide sudokus to several Swedish newspapers. On the other hand, I haven't looked so I don't know if there is ever a reference to who constructed the sudoku, apart from the Pappocoms in Aftonbladet.

All other newspaper sudokus I've tried in Swedish papers and on-line newspapers have been solvable by using logic; just recently levels have increased so that you actually need to use hidden pairs and triplets and such things, but still solvable.

Unfortunately, the Sydsvenskan sudoku is only available on-line one day, today they only have a medium one, so I've never managed to get to any of the hard ones that Christer and Annika have found (Sydsvenskan is a local newspaper in the South, so I don't get the paper either)

[Pappocom]

According an article in the newspaper Sydsvenska Dagbladet (July 2nd), their Sudokus are Pappocom, provided to them from a communication bureau (Jeffery and Edling) who also provide sudokus to other Swedish Newspapers.

This is news to me! They are not Pappocom puzzles.

- Wayne