Sudoku Everywhere!

Sudoku is a logic/puzzle game that has become very popular. The game is played on a 9 x 9 grid. Some of the grid's cells contain numbers. The object of the game is to fill all empty cells of the grid with digits 1 through 9. To solve the puzzle, every row, column, and 3 x 3 section must contain the numbers 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, and 9 once and only once. With a true Sudoku grid, there is only one solution for the puzzle. Try going through this illustrated Sudoku tutorial to learn more about game play.

It generally takes from 10 to 30 minutes to solve a puzzle, depending on your skill and experience. Sudoku puzzles can be found in many places. Along side crossword puzzles, many newspapers are publishing daily Sudoku puzzles. And, as you might guess, there are Sudoku games for handhelds and other computers!

For Palm, try out these two freeware applications: SuLite and Sudoku. I like SuLite because you can change the Display Options to use colored blocks, mathematical symbols, or letters instead of numbers on the grid. Sudoku will generate random puzzles for you (though it may take a while for the puzzles to be created). Sudoku is also in constant development and more features are being added with each version release.

For Windows Mobile, try Sudoku Solver, which can solve games or create new ones for you to solve yourself.

You can purchase Sudoku games for your handheld if you want extra features or a cleaner interface. Read PalmInfocenter's article about Sudoku from for Palm ($9.95 - Palm OS 5 only) or for Windows Mobile from Astraware.

You can even play Sudoku online right in your web browser here, here, and here (Flash Player required). Or, download a free version for Windows. There's even a free Dashboard widget for Mac OS 10.4.

Learn how to make your own Sudoku puzzles on paper for yourself or others to solve. Let's Make Sudoku: Elementary Course shows you step-by-step how to create a puzzle. The site says it's fun and easy. In fact, here's a PDF with four blank grids to help you out. I think students would really enjoy learning to make their own Sudoku puzzles.

Sudoku is a very addictive game, so whether you use paper, Palm, Windows Mobile, Windows, Mac, or the Web, have fun!