SourGumdropK Kakuro: Introduction

Introduction

SourGumdropK is a Kakuro / Cross sum playing program with a range of helpful options. It can be downloaded for free from this site.

Features

An easily-used puzzle solving interface
Continuously updated combination lists for all clues
Hints for fifteen solving methods
Error checking
Undo mechanism
Built-in puzzles
Puzzle input methods
Puzzle saving and reloading methods
Difficulty ratings
Kakuro source code included

The Overview page gives a good idea of some of the program's main features. Of course the only way to really know if you like a program is to try it...

A typical screendump

Figure 2. A screen dump from SourGumdropK showing a hint for method "UC" and a pop-up listing the possible combinations for the sum 12 in 4 cells. The hint has identified that the candidates shaded red can be removed.

News

February 18th 2011

Latest changes described here.

April 4th 2010

Version 1.07 released to fix bug in v1.05.

March 30th 2010

Version 1.05 released. The main changes:

1. Very much faster solver for external puzzles.

2. Greatly reduced memory usage.

3. Save and load options now include all history data.

4. 200 new built-in puzzles.

5. Added option to switch off colour coding of cell information content.

Thanks again to Kevin Flaherty.

January 12th 2010

Version 1.04 released. Added options to save and reload partially completed puzzles. Thanks again to Kevin Flaherty for help with testing.

January 6th 2010

Version 1.03 released. Thanks to Kevin Flaherty for reporting a serious bug revealed by a published puzzle with more than one solution.

1. Code for solving puzzles read from files and for checking uniqueness was unreliable. Fixed.

2. Isolated necks code needed an additional check.

3. Added timer cursors to slow operations like solving external puzzles and uniqueness checking.

October 26th 2008

Python version 2.6 was released recently and unfortunately it contains a bug which broke SourGumdropK. This new version of SourGumdropK (v1.02) provides a workaround for that bug and also improves some of the related code. Though a workaround it is a permanent solution. Testing with 2.6 has shown that when Python moves to 3.0 the programs should all work.

October 7th 2008

Bug fixes. Version upped to v1.01. A user suspected that a Guardian puzzle had more than one solution and so attempted to read it into SourGumdropK. A typo in the parsing code meant that this puzzle could not be interpreted correctly. This was fixed along with other bugs. The user was correct and SourGumdropK reported the puzzle as being non-unique. Note that for some puzzles the uniqueness check is still very slow. I urge all users to report bugs as soon as possible.

April 20th 2008

Version v0.02 released. Added the cell count and the sum to the pop-up menus which provide the row and column combination lists. Added configuration options.