I came across a different version of Numbrix called Jadium. Well, not really, I stumbled on a page with a single static example (above). Numbrix is a fairly simple game, you just need to fill in all the 9 x 9 square with the numbers from 1 to 81 in sequence. It shows up in the Sunday newspaper supplement Parade, if you still get the Sunday paper. It's usually pretty easy, but change up the starting configuration just a bit and it can quickly become more difficult. Jadium is supposed to be more difficult and given that it has only a few numbers posted to start, I can see that it could be. But no on-line version, and just this one image, so I'm wondering if it is even possible to solve it.
How-some-ever, I wrote a program a while back to solve Numbrix puzzles and since this one conforms to the same rules as Numbrix, it should be able to solve it. So I tried it out.
Just for a baseline, I tried it with a completely empty field.
+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+
| 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 |
+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+
| 18 | 17 | 16 | 15 | 14 | 13 | 12 | 11 | 10 |
+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+
| 19 | 20 | 21 | 22 | 23 | 24 | 25 | 26 | 27 |
+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+
| 36 | 35 | 34 | 33 | 32 | 31 | 30 | 29 | 28 |
+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+
| 37 | 38 | 39 | 40 | 41 | 42 | 43 | 44 | 45 |
+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+
| 54 | 53 | 52 | 51 | 50 | 49 | 48 | 47 | 46 |
+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+
| 55 | 56 | 57 | 58 | 59 | 60 | 61 | 62 | 63 |
+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+
| 72 | 71 | 70 | 69 | 68 | 67 | 66 | 65 | 64 |
+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+
| 73 | 74 | 75 | 76 | 77 | 78 | 79 | 80 | 81 |
+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+
Number of calls to tracking procedure: 190
No problem, filled in the field very quickly. Next I tried it with the Jadium example.
+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+
| 57 | 56 | 55 | 54 | 53 | 52 | 51 | 50 | 49 |
+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+
| 58 | 59 | 60 | 61 | 64 | 65 | 46 | 47 | 48 |
+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+
| 3 | 2 | 1 | 62 | 63 | 66 | 45 | 44 | 43 |
+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+
| 4 | 73 | 72 | 71 | 70 | 67 | 24 | 25 | 42 |
+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+
| 5 | 74 | 77 | 78 | 69 | 68 | 23 | 26 | 41 |
+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+
| 6 | 75 | 76 | 79 | 20 | 21 | 22 | 27 | 40 |
+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+
| 7 | 8 | 9 | 80 | 19 | 32 | 31 | 28 | 39 |
+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+
| 12 | 11 | 10 | 81 | 18 | 33 | 30 | 29 | 38 |
+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+
| 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 34 | 35 | 36 | 37 |
+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+----+
Number of calls to tracking procedure: 323,522,476
This one took a while, several seconds in fact, long enough to make me wonder if it had gotten hung up. But no, it just took a while.
Source code can be found here.
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