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That's right! If you're a puzzlecrafter, as many people on this site are, then you can be featured on my blog! The catch? The puzzle must be of the genre that I specify, the clues have to be in the arrangement that I specify, and you only have 3 weeks to create your puzzle and e-mail it to me. But hopefully you all are flexible enough to handle that, right?

First off, the genre will be one which is not (yet) featured on Puzzle Picnic: Polyominous (also known as Fillomino). Polyominous is a genre that involves partitioning a grid of squares along the grid lines (much like Neighbours and Spiral Galaxies puzzles). The clues are in the form of numbers inside some of the grid cells. The objective is to partition the grid such that each number is contained in a region containing that many cells, and no two regions which contain identical numbers of cells share an edge. A region may contain a single number, multiple identical numbers, or even no numbers at all, adding to the challenge. See this page for a simple 7x7 example puzzle and its solution. Also, click here to view other Polyominous puzzles on my blog; it is recommended that you do so to gain familiarity with the genre before attempting to construct your own.

To participate in this Logicsmith Exhibition, click on this link. You will see a 10x10 grid with question marks on it. Your challenge is to create a uniquely solvable Polyominous puzzle by replacing each question mark with an integer. E-mail your puzzle to glmathgrant@gmail.com, and in three weeks, I'll post the results on my blog! I hope you enjoy the challenge of working with a new puzzle genre, and I look forward to interesting results.

Nice initiative! Am I allowed to put the number 100 at each of the question marks?

Maarten wrote:

Nice initiative! Am I allowed to put the number 100 at each of the question marks?

That would indeed be a solvable puzzle, Maarten! However, I hope to receive puzzles that are a bit more interesting than that.

Besides, I wouldn't be able to fit a 100 in a square without shrinking the font size; any number from 1 through 99 will fit perfectly, though.

I receive my first entry today; it was really interesting! I like interesting things.

Anyway, just bumping the topic to remind you that you have two weeks left to interest me.

The results are in.

http://mathgrant.blogspot.com/2008/12/logicsmith-exhibition-2-polyominous.html

Thanks for your entry, Johan!

It's time for another Logicsmith Exhibition!

http://mathgrant.blogspot.com/2009/08/logicsmith-exhibition-3-polyominous.html

Good luck!

It's time for another Logicsmith Exhibition! This time, you're tasked to compose a Slalom puzzle. This puzzle has yet to appear on Puzzle Picnic; you need to draw a loop that passes through each dotted line exactly once, and in the order dictated by the numbers. Here are more detailed rules and a simple 7x7 example puzzle, and here are more Slalom puzzles to help you understand the concept. Visit http://mathgrant.blogspot.com/2009/12/logicsmith-exhibition-3-circumnavi.html for more information on the Logicsmith Exhibition!