tokada@wasat.usc.edu (Tom Okada) (05/10/87)
....a program that will fill a matrix with words in a crossword-like fashion (with all words across and down being a valid dictionary word). The program will get words from dictionary that I provide. The matrix will be typically a 30x30. Certain other rules are given which make the problem very interesting. If it's so interesting why don't I write it myself you ask, well, I have tried. I began to write it in pascal then stopped because I was not too comfortable with it. I then learned C and I got much further in C, but was not satisfied with the final program. I took the brute force approach, finding a group of words that will fit and placing them in the puzzle one after the other. As you can see the only matrix I was able to fill in a reasonable amt of time was a 4x4 one and even that did not satisfy my other rules. I heard about Prolog recently and it seems ideal for problems that involve trying many different possibilities and require list processing. As you can tell I am not a programmer and do not know PROLOG at all. I am looking for someone who might find this problem interesting enough to try. If you are interested please reply to me at ARPA: tokada@wasat.usc.edu UUCP: ...!sdcrdcf!oberon!wasat!tokada and I will send you the specs of the problem. Include your phone # and best time to call for faster replies. I really don't care which compiler is used as long as it is not a hack'd one and it can run on a PC-DOS or UNIX system. If this posting breaks one of the rules of this group, please let me know POLITELY. thanks in advance for your replies.