Related papers: Finding a Unique Solution to Radon-Kaczmarz Puzzle…
In this paper we demonstrate a method for counting the number of solutions to various logic puzzles. Specifically, we remove all of the "clues" from the puzzle which help the solver to a unique solution, and instead start from an empty…
The Kaczmarz algorithm is an iterative method that solves linear systems of equations. It stands out among iterative algorithms when dealing with large systems for two reasons. First, at each iteration, the Kaczmarz algorithm uses a single…
This paper is concerned with the problem of finding $n$ distinct squares such that, on excluding any one of them, the sum of the remaining $n-1$ squares is a square. While parametric solutions are known when $n=3$ and $n=4$, when $n > 4$,…
It has been shown that any 9 by 9 Sudoku puzzle must contain at least 17 clues to have a unique solution. This paper investigates the more specific question: given a particular completed Sudoku grid, what is the minimum number of clues in…
Over the last decade, Sudoku, a combinatorial number-placement puzzle, has become a favorite pastimes of many all around the world. In this puzzle, the task is to complete a partially filled $9 \times 9$ square with numbers 1 through 9,…
The Number Rotation Puzzle (NRP) is a combination puzzle in which the goal is to rearrange a scrambled rectangular grid of numbers back into order via moves that consist of rotating square blocks of numbers of fixed size. Over all possible…
The Kaczmarz method is a way to iteratively solve a linear system of equations $Ax = b$. One interprets the solution $x$ as the point where hyperplanes intersect and then iteratively projects an approximate solution onto these hyperplanes…
We study a family of sorting match puzzles on grids, which we call permutation match puzzles. In this puzzle, each row and column of a $n \times n$ grid is labeled with an ordering constraint -- ascending (A) or descending (D) -- and the…
A random jigsaw puzzle is constructed by arranging $n^2$ square pieces into an $n \times n$ grid and assigning to each edge of a piece one of $q$ available colours uniformly at random, with the restriction that touching edges receive the…
The Collatz conjecture is one of the easiest mathematical problems to state and yet it remains unsolved. For each $n\ge 2$ the Collatz iteration is mapped to a binary sequence and a corresponding unique integer which can recreate the…
To find the least squares solution of a very large and inconsistent system of equations, one can employ the extended Kaczmarz algorithm. This method simultaneously removes the error term, such that a consistent system is asymptotically…
For Latin squares the units (rows and columns) have fixed sum. The same holds for rows, columns, and blocks in Sudokus. Summing the elements of a unit yields a linear equation, and the set of all such equations forms a system of linear…
A Sudoku puzzle often has a regular pattern in the arrangement of initial digits and it is typically made solvable with known solving techniques, called strategies. In this paper, we consider the problem of generating such Sudoku instances.…
The randomized Kaczmarz (RK) method is a well-known approach for solving linear least-squares problems with a large number of rows. RK accesses and processes just one row at a time, leading to exponentially fast convergence for consistent…
The random reshuffling Kaczmarz (RRK) method enjoys the simplicity and efficiency in solving linear systems as a Kaczmarz-type method, whereas it also inherits the practical improvements of the stochastic gradient descent (SGD) with random…
We consider apictorial edge-matching puzzles, in which the goal is to arrange a collection of puzzle pieces with colored edges so that the colors match along the edges of adjacent pieces. We devise an algebraic representation for this…
We investigate a type of a Sudoku variant called Sudo-Kurve, which allows bent rows and columns, and develop a new, yet equivalent, variant we call a Sudo-Cube. We examine the total number of distinct solution grids for this type with or…
The randomized Kaczmarz algorithm has received considerable attention recently because of its simplicity, speed, and the ability to approximately solve large-scale linear systems of equations. In this paper we propose randomized double and…
For any odd integer $n\geq3$ a board (of size $n$) is a square array of $n\times n$ positions with a simple rule of how to move between positions. The goal of the game we introduce is to find a path from the upper left corner of a board to…
In a typical regular expression (regex) crossword puzzle, you are given two nonempty lists $R_1,\ldots,R_m$ and $C_1,\ldots,C_n$ of regular expressions over some alphabet, and your goal is to fill in an $m\times n$ grid with letters from…