UK Puzzle Association

Hi,

Logic Masters India announces March Sudoku Test — LMI Spring Sudoku Test

By Francophone Sudoku Authors

Date : 26th and 27th March

IB and Submission Link : Here

Discussion on dedicated topic

Sudoku Theme is based on Spring - 12 puzzles of different types (from common variants to new ones) are to solve within 120 minutes. Check the IB !

When was the last weekend LMI weren't doing some sort of contest!?

Some of the ideas look very interesting - and if it's anything like the no alphabet, the puzzles are likely to be tough. Hopefully I'll have time for this one!

detuned wrote:When was the last weekend LMI weren't doing some sort of contest!?

I think the Tapa Variations are primarily responsible for that. They have generally been shooting for two contests per month (one sudoku, one mixed puzzles), but when you throw in Tapa every other week the month fills right up.

detuned wrote:Some of the ideas look very interesting - and if it's anything like the no alphabet, the puzzles are likely to be tough. Hopefully I'll have time for this one!

Yes, Sylvain has this gift to create tough grids . And also Bastien, sometimes . other authors have therefore had to create easy grids to offset that fact

Definitely worth doing, even if you aren't bothered with the UK sudoku ranking table!

Is there any chance of getting an announcement in the announcement forum to remind those who might be interested?

detuned wrote:... even if you aren't bothered with the UK sudoku ranking table!
Is there any chance of getting an announcement in the announcement forum to remind those who might be interested?

This isn't the April Sudoku contest is it? Let me know asap if it is!

No definitely the march contest.

Sorry, for some reason it hadn't registered that March wasn't counting (hence a bit of a recent posting frenzy!) Sorry for the false alarm!

I feel a bit better about the 100 points I've needlessly thrown away now

I have printing problems with this one. Whether it is something to do with the size of the file, or that some of it's colour (I only have b&W printer) I'm not sure. Started the test last night and it was 1 hour 40 before 1 page printed out and had to try and solve on screen. (I'm not good at Sudoku at the best of times, so that was even worse!) I've just sent it to print again and still no joy. I haven't had a problem with any of the other LMI ones.

hoofy wrote:I have printing problems with this one. Whether it is something to do with the size of the file, or that some of it's colour (I only have b&W printer) I'm not sure. Started the test last night and it was 1 hour 40 before 1 page printed out and had to try and solve on screen. (I'm not good at Sudoku at the best of times, so that was even worse!) I've just sent it to print again and still no joy. I haven't had a problem with any of the other LMI ones.

Hoofy, I'm very surprised and sorry for you to read that comment !

I don't know what was the problem. Can you tell what happens when you try to print, is there an alert message that comes from your printer? Can you tell us if you can print the Instruction Booklet or is there the same problem?

I'm convinced that the problem is not the size of file, and I doubt the problem is colours in the file !

All that I can say for people that haven't started yet is that, what we see til now, lot of players submitted via paper-submission mode, so lot of people haven't no problem to print and solve on paper.

Hope we can find what is the problem for you, hoofy.

Fred

Hi, I've just tried to print the instruction booklet out. It printed the first two pages okay, then stopped. The only message I get is on my printer status that shows error-printing, so I've no idea. I've not had a problem before with the LMI site. The printer that I've got is a HP Laserjet 1300.as it looks like a problem at my end. I've tried printing from my son's computer to my printer too and that seems to work okay. Just tried the instruction book from mine again and just got the first two pages.
Thanks,
Liane

It's very strange, I don't know what is the problem with these pdf files.

I hope that next time it will work fine for you !

Fred

I had the same problem when printing out the instruction booklet in work.

However, no problem with the puzzle file at home.

David McNeill.

Very slow printing times/failed prints from older laser printers are usually caused by a lack of memory on the printer. Files with images like these can cause the buffers to be exceeded. I've seen this problem with other older laser printers too. I just checked the instruction booklet and puzzle booklet PDFs with the professional version of Adobe Acrobat and it reported no problems with the PDF itself.

In these files the puzzles are huge bitmap grabs - these will inevitably print slowly and cause all manner of printer memory problems if for example you print via postscript so that the render is performed on the printer itself. Ideally the booklet should use vector art instead.

Gareth, thank you for these informations.

I thought the puzzle booklet were not so big (343Ko) so that it causes some problems with some printers.
Also, puzzles images are not so huge: between 10 - 20 Ko for each png file.
I'm sorry for people who had this problem.

Fred

Fred - I copied-pasted some of the images from the pdf. I don't doubt the memory on the disk they take up is very small, but the files themselves have sizes of 900x900 pixels - they appear to have been scaled down to fit onto the size of an a4 document. For the sake of comparison, most of my own puzzles fit very nicely as 1:1 on A4, and they are 2-3 times (in length) smaller than that.

Perhaps this is what the issue is?

Perhaps ...

I hope next time I organise a competition, I'll be able to do a clean pdf and that nobody will have problems !
That is the big deal with computer and printer: when it works fine for you and for other organisers, it's difficult to anticipate problems that could appear...

Fred

I've found out more about my print problem. I have gone into the advanced button from the print screen panel then select print as image and it has worked. Don't know whether this will solve the problem for other people.