Sudoku

Since discovering Sudoku, I've been fascinated by the puzzles. Solving them is a pleasant way to pass a bus journey. But the real joy for me was working out new ways to tackle the problems. The result of that fascination is this program.

Some might object to mechanical aids for solving Sudoku puzzles, perhaps viewing it as "cheating". In fact, there are straight- forward, guaranteed-successful techniques for solving Sudoku by hand. I've included one in the appendix of the README.

In creating this program, I've tried to make it useful for a range of people. As well as solving the puzzle, SudokuSolver announces if the solution is not unique, and can be set to only give the next step, for those who might want a hint rather than a solution.

Whenever possible, the program attempts to find a unique next step - one that can be worked out from logic, rather than guessing. Sometimes it is not possible to solve a puzzle without guesswork. For example, any puzzle which does not have a unique solution requires guesses at some point. SudokuSolver admits when it needs to guess.

SudokuSolver is very much a work in progress. New techniques for solving puzzles will be added as I uncover them. However, I believe that the program already solves all puzzles which have solutions.

Download

Sudoku Solver (0.1)

README
License

Installation

This software requires the Microsoft .NET Framework to be installed on your computer. Most modern Windows systems have .NET installed by default. If yours doesn't, the installer will attempt to download the .NET framework for you. This may take some time. Failing that, .NET can be downloaded from http://www.microsoft.com

The software only runs on Windows. It has been tested on Me and XP, and should run on other variants as well. If you have problems, please see the README section on reporting bugs, under "Contacting the Author".

To install double-click on the SETUP.exe icon, and follow the on- screen instructions.