Ahhh, medium

don't do it if you want your Cream o' the Crop ranking to go up

Means nothing... dunno who works out difficulty..

the puzzles are generated by a program, so i guess you just ask it for a "medium" level puzzle

Cream of the Crop, bleh

Once I've done enough puzzles I'll be up on top of there anyway

:)

Hi all

hi NJL

Hi NJL

Is this a rel medium, or a hard in disguise?

who knows......lol

So far I'd say it's pretty Medium

morning folks :D ...now I can have a Babble icon and a Sudoku icon...

morning Sherb

hi Debs :D ...do you have beautiful sunshine this morning too?

yes it looks like it's going to be a lovely day.. sun shining, birds singing...

It is a lovely sunny 27C day here today

Not sure its 27 here...lol

grey as usual here

we've got sunshine, but not warmth yet... probably about 15c today... where are you NJL?

Dark here

lol@sell

Perth Australia

Hehe

Where in US are you?

California

ahhhhh... that would explain it... :D

Its always sunny there isnt it!

Almost

Ahh, I'm in Northern CA though, it rains here around this time of year

Always sunny in the summer though

Hi all!!!

Even on days when it rains, we usually get some time outside in the sun!

Hi Schroeder

ALways sunny in England in the summer... just it hides,,,,

Haha

Hiya Schro

Schro!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I'm in CA...lots of snow on the ground

Tahoe?

Sherb!!!! how you doing?

My Mums going up there for a holiday this year...

Lucky cow...lol

About 20 min from Tahoe

Nice

Haven't been able to go up there this winter

Usually I get to once or twice

Have't been able to get away this year..lol

Im going away on 24th

I'm great Schro... celebrating a promotion at work, and the sun's shining today, and I start two week's holiday next Friday... great!! ...how are you?

Congrats Sherb!!!! How exciting for you. Are you going away for holiday? I've just been working and hoping to see the sun sometime..

thanks Schro :D ...mainly just chilling at home, and doing a few jobs around the house... but may go to the coast if the weather is good, ie anything over10c!!

I'm going to the Bay Area in a few weeks (by sellout) to visit family..I know it will be warmer there.

I'll see you there Schroeder :P I'm flying over to SF in 3 weeks!

It's gettin warmer

Still a bit rainy

I'm done...

Really Atalante!!! Are you visiting family?

sellout I would be happy with some rain vs more snow!!

just friends :) I'm flying into SF, spending a week just south of there, then driving up to Oregon (more friends) via Yosemite for a week and a bit then flying home

Take care everyone.... Good luck..cya tomorrow

How fun that sounds Atalante!!
Bye Debs, Congrats!!!

Later Debs

seeya Debs

it should be wonderful :) and 2 weeks without husband as well! freedom!

LOL Atalante.....you wild woman!!

Oops, only half a dozen squares left, and I made a mistake

2 weeks with out husband and kids sounds like heaven :)

tell me about it :P

Done...I'd say that was a fair Medium

Off to enjoy Saturday night...later all

Have a great night

Bye sellout!!

that was fun! wheee! am outta here - going to the seaside for the day. have fun all!

Sounds great...have fun

Bye Atalante, have a grate time!!!!

Oops, make that a great time!!!

RIP NORNNA

Not getting far tonight, off to get some sleep..nite all!

oooppss again, down to the last two squares, only to find out that I made another error somewhere

sleep well

nornna will be back

if you strike her down, she will return greater than before.

morning /evening all... did the US change to summer time over night?

like darth vader.

yes it did, ginger

hehe

my us time hasn't changed yet

does at 2am doesn't it comatose?

yes ;)

hiya evryone!!!!

Hi Bex

Third time lucky

I wish I knew what I did wrong, I seemed to do exactly the same thing 3 times in a row

i did that the other day on the easy one, i just kept doing it all wrong.!

Time to play with the kids

Time to play with the kids

see u later!! have fun!

Will do :)

booyar

well the 4's were easy anyway!

finished!

wd bex!

Done

Back from tennis, time to get going again!

uck, i'm so stuck with this one

it's not becoming immediately obvious for me orrorin.... I forsee a restart!

i've got a little less than half done and i just can't seem to get it any further.. may have to try again in the morning

yeah, sleep deprivation doesn't help!

hello everybody

Hi there :)

Morning!

hi sprite

Morning People

morning Lime

morning

Limer!

Hey, beautiful

morning caderoux

Hello Caderoux

Oh, geez

First brain fart of the day!

LOL Limer... I have a few of them too!

Tried to put a 4 in the lower left box

There was one already there from the git go.

LOL

More like Gol

Groan out loud

:-)

I'll have to come back later, I have to bring a houseguest back to his post at the work camp.

HouseGuest?

cya later caderoux

I'll most likely be gone, CU later Caderoux!

Man, Is my brain dead this morning.

mine always is with these!

I feel your pain

Hee Hee

Great button, that Start Over button.

hi all

hi all :)

hi everyone! y'all survive the lost hour of sleep? :-)

done... oddly, yesterday's easy stumped me more. either the software that determines difficulty is wonky, or my brain is. this morning, I think I'll vote for option B :)

done

that was relatively easy

bed time for me now

hmm, stuck 1/2 way done

chebuctonian: I agree on the "easiness" here!

I have a favor to ask of someone who has already completed the puzzle today and has a little extra time... I have finished the puzzle, but I did it through an elaborate game of "what-if" that I think was unnecessary. I would love for someone who's more familiar with advanced techniques to look at a screen shot of a point where I was stuck and give me some tips about where I could eliminate numbers more easily...

do you have a screenshot posted somewhere on the web? I'll give it a shot.

morning/afternoon sudoku-ers!!

Christopher - don't have a screenshot posted, but I could email one to you. Email me if you are willing - I'm at
mathmagic

t

rcn.com

ok sent

ok sent

thx

Done! This one seemed easier than a medium

macuser, your cat's really pretty!

Thank you Krys :) He thinks so too ;)

so what does everyone think of the rankings?

i was thinking about the rankings some last night and wrote a bit about them here for anyone interested: http://tinyurl.com/kh7y7

Krys10, instead of a screenshot, does it work to paste a text version of the puzzle here? I haven't tried that before.

Since that would show proper positions of some of the numbers, I suspect you would really irritate a lot of people....

This isn't a non-proportional font, so it might look a little weird, but or example, todays puzzle would be

*-----------*
|..7|.5.|.3.|
|43.|.2.|...|
|..9|.74|.5.|
|---+---+---|
|..6|4..|7..|
|9..|...|..4|
|..4|..1|6..|
|---+---+---|
|.9.|84.|1..|
|...|.1.|.26|
|.5.|.6.|9..|
*-----------*

BrandyJack, that is a very good point. I guess you'd have to wait til the next day for that.

hola

is that today's puzzle ?

yes.

assuming i entered it correctly.

why did you post it ?

its just the given values.

davidtoc, interesting blog, but it seems all you do is declare something then back peddle. should i do all the puzzles? ;-)

i know, just curious why

i say do them all, cause it's more fun that way.

my opinion as well!

one ranking (Village Elders) rewards you for doing every puzzle. the other (Cream o the crop) rewards people who only do harder puzzles.

yes don't back pedal. fo them all!

hmmmm, why not make a suggestion to dr-g?

so the question boils down to: which ranking do you care about, or even: do you care about your ranking or would you rather just solve sudoku puzzles? :)

i'm sure he reads these chat sessions.

the real question is, if the moon was made out of cheese would you eat it?

oh, definitely guerro

yes. yes, i would.

you should read that in a Harry Carey voice

;)

ok, i'm off to brunch. see u all later!

have a mamosa for me

consider it done.

hello

my rankings were pretty low down there and i've been solving these things for like 2 weeks!

this one seems pretty easy so far...

my ranking is holding the rest up!!

lol ginger

same here ginger!

over :)

under

miller, according to davidtoc, solving 'all' the puzzles hurts your ranking

yeah, i noticed that. cuz then your average isn't as good because you're not solving all the "expert" puzzles!

that's ok, i just think sudoku is really fun!

its a total catch 22 - to solve or not to solve, that is the question

I think davidtoc is wrong... you get a point for every puzzle solved, so if you don't do the hard ones, you will be overtaken by those who do

yeah but then if you do the easy's it throws off your average!

actually, davidtoc says you should only do the expert ones.

in the LONG run, it pays to do every puzzle, because u get a point for every puzzle.

my head is muddled, i may need a daquari.

but for the first 200-300 games, people who only do the hard and expert games will have a higher Cream O The Crop ranking.

that makes sense! that means if i keep this up for 2 years i might be ranked a litte higher!

hmmmmmmm.m.m.m.m.m...m.m.....m.m.......m

it's the same as the Babble rankings, the people at the top have been playing for a long time and complete nearly every day

so long as i get a puzzle every day, i'm happy.

ditto evanonut~

ditto, evanonut

jinx david! lol

awe, now david is nice! no jinxing david.

haha! i was just gonna say that!

see evan, he's just as mean as i am!

okay, you're a couple of sinister ones then!

bwahahahaha!

oh the humanity

i love when sudokus start solving themselves!

something wrong with the total points amount in the 'elders' column in ranking. yesterday i had 16 points. today it is 2 points for puzzle completion but i have only 17. What is goin on? please, can someone explain?

perhaps the scores are tallied at midnight?

yeah the same thing here...19 yesterday and 20 today. mediums are worth 2!!! I'm being cheated!! also my cream o the crop ranking went down like 10 pts!

yeah maybe ashling but now i have to do something productive with my life (not that sudoku isn't productive) but have tons of work to do! bye all!

it is not important fo me personally, but Dr God should say that second column is not the thotal amount of points earned, but total number of puzzles played. :)

hooray! my second one completed!

Git along little doogie

yippee ki yi yay

Way to go, Hershy

oh i am not done

i was just joining your cowboy song

Oops?

just happy to be here?

i just popped in from babble

Babble?

is babble a biggie today?

190

oh that's not too bad might try that once I have finished here

it's a nice one

babble is a word game Limer

i have 15 left, haven't used the list yet

you can get to it byt the link at the top, it is another Dr God goodie

WTG Hurshy

it is relaxing to fill in a few numbers, give my brain a break, maybe then when i go back i will see more words

*lola skids into sudoku* hello!...Moozey! Looooong time, no see! How are you?

you must live farther from sudoku than i do, loly, it took you so long to get here

LOL! lola's are easily distracted, I'm afraid : )

How's this one looking then??

easy peasy lemon {{}}

get it loly???? :)

Hey babe : )

lol, very clever hursh. I'm laughing somethin' awful! :; )

:D

...someone needed to say somethin' awful, somethin' awful?? : D

did you fill him in on it, loly?

aww, I'm missin' ya somethin' awful babe! :' )

awww {{{xx}}} : )

Good lola how are you

mmmm, squeezy hugs AND kisses : )

so do we need to pay both in babble and in here?

for all the extras?

Hi Moozey, yup, they stand alone : )

I'm good thanks moozey : )

ahhhh I thought so, best dust off the credit card again haha

Help! The little green numbers are taking over! : (

...that matrix has you } )

...now you're imagining me in that tight shiny outfit carrie wears...aren't you? } )

Not all all! So, can you cartwheel??

..with these gals?? lol : D

*cough*

caught my cold Hursh? ; )

no, healthy as a horse

I will take that as a neigh then : D

just didn't think it was polite to be eavesdropping on this without making my presence known

lol

(done!)

sorry hursh...I'll behave : )

Yay! well done levi : )

Nailed that puppy!

Rank me baby!

yay! Go limer! : )

Woot! : D

i'm not even close : /

I was doing fantastically well until a certainl little person wanted to play and then I hit save as checkpoint instead of return to checkpoint <sigh>

he left it dead and with its head he went galumphing back

(apropos of nothing...just running through my head...thought i'd try to get it out)

okie dokie now to see if i can get last 7 without list

you done hurshy?

list?

hurshy's talking about Babble, levi : )

damn!

...did you guess??

Yup : / no logical leads

there's no need to guess on this one babe : )

i think i'm stuck...i may have to guess

That's the issue, it worked. I'm just nosing at the rankings now and they don't make any sense either, lol!

migrod, go through your green numbers and elliminate first : )

aah, so it was one of your 'logical' guesses then? ; )

Not really. I used the subscripts and came to a point where the next choice was 50:50 in several places so I just walked the plank... : / It's not pretty but it works : )

lol, are you enjoying the JJ babe? : )

Yes thanks. Haven't downloaded today's mail yet though... I've been listening to Surfjan Stevens (jury's definately out in him) and The Bronx just now. They are OK : )

I'm calling it a night babe. Did you get my mail (last) today?

Not yet - will go and have a nose now : )

done... no guessing required

Dr God, where are you? there are some things to talk about

yul, there is a link at the bottom of the page to e-mail him

cool :)

At last... done!!

finally finished

wheeeeeee

pd is a dork

michelle is mean

Surfjan Stevens's Illinoise took me a while to get into, but the tracks that are real songs are quite good, I think.

so clearly the ranking encourage me to skip the easy ones and only do the hard ones!

hmm ... yeah

the algorithm seems a little off to me. I haven't done must research on this yet but the ranking should encourage participation and allow new comers a chance to compete also.

?????

well, one of the algorithms encourages participation, and the other one allows a chance for newcomers to compete. It's just that neither ranking does both at the same time.

sorry. i didn't realize i was responding to a comment from over an hour ago. :)

yay done

no problem .... Im still here.

=)

Done like a steak on the sun

sweet.... off too bed. take care everybody

Christopher, I am looking at your email now with a student who is a Sudoku fan and better at them than me :)

i hope it helps. is the notation clear? I dont know if its standard notation I just started from the top left with 1,1.

I got it after you replied and clarified. I figured out a pattern that I tend to miss.

The rankings are rankling, I agree. They'll even out once the site has been up for longer, I bet...

sweet ... I might publish it to a public site. i wanted to see if it would help first.

What has been difficult for me reading the websites is that they frequently rely on notation without enough pictures.

the thing that gets me about the ranking is that a person that joins and solves one expert will have a ranking equal to someone that solves every puzzle for almost a year.

yeah, i was thinking about the rankings a lot last nite. they're weird that way.

but that's only true for the Cream O' The Crop. For the Village Elders, someone who solves every puzzle has the advantage.

right

i posted this earlier, but here it is again. I wrote about it a bit here: http://tinyurl.com/kh7y7

and eventually, the other rankings will even out, because people who play every puzzle for a year will have 365 points added on to their puzzle average.

yes, exactly.

but for the first 200-300 games, someone who only plays the harder puzzles will have the higher cream o the crop ranking score.

it does irk me, thogh, that there haven't been any expert puzzles lately for me to boost my average :)

the key is longevity :)

that's fine with me, Krys10. I have a hard time with those. Too guessy.

Finished whoohoo!!

nothing like getting down to the final squares and realizing you've got a mistake somewhere

I've never played this before. I understand the rules, but wonder if there's a good place to learn tips for strategy..

http://www.writely.com/View.aspx?docid=bbfm2k
df5zzzv

Morning all

greets Debs

Hiya Cam

Cham even

YOu still doing or just waiting?

funny how I'm often finally finding the time to finish the puzzle just as you're gearing up for the next one

Probably cos I just got up and your about to go to bed.... ( If you in USA I mean)

Canada

I'm in England..

so I've read

Nice of you to remember....

Anyone worked out the ratings yet? Seems like a load of tosh to me!

yeah...doesn't really benefit until about 350 games played

Oh...only a year then.....

yeah...only

Sounds like something a politcian would say.....lol

~breathes~

ok..done

wd Cham

Think I'll go grab a cuppa.....

..?

Tea

Have clocks gone back over there this wend?

ya

Oh... ours changed wend before...