OddThinking

Eight years ago, I posted a description of an Alphametics Helper. I wasn’t much interested in the answers (as was evidenced by the fact it gave wrong answers, and I only just noticed) so much as the architecture – I wanted to implement a new Puzzle Solving Framework that later proved to be very versatile. […]

The challenge: What sentence becomes another valid sentence when ROT13ed?

Long-term readers (given the radio silence, do I have any other type?) will remember that I wrote a Puzzle Solving Framework to help solve “newspaper” pencil-and-paper puzzles. I’ve been thinking of preparing a presentation about it for a local Python group, so I decided to implement another one. Introducing Light Up Light Up is an […]

Apparently, I used C# well before the iPhone.

Report generation involves a conflict of interest, leading to proliferation.

I introduce the game of Captive Queens, explain the rules, analyse the tactics and determine the chance of winning.

To decide who is “it” (or “in”) first, in a playground game, such as chasey (a.k.a. tag), a fixed algorithmic process is used to make a pseudo-random choice.

Of course, this is a deterministic procedure, and we can, with diligence, careful calculation, computational power and just a little bit of luck, reverse engineer the algorithm and determine who will be eventually selected.

Progress Bars haven’t progressed much for over a decade.

Let me tell about the Progress Bar component that I will definitely one day develop, with the one proviso: I will probably never develop it.

How many Australian locations have repeated names, like Wagga Wagga, Woy Woy and Curl Curl?

Here is a software analysis anti-pattern I have seen many times in my career. It is popping up in my current project, and I am trying to work out how to subvert it early.