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Sudoku Tutor 1.0 User Manual

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CAPABILITIES OF SUDOKU TUTOR 1.0 .............................................................................................................. 2 INSTALLATION AND START-UP ........................................................................................................................ 3 PURCHASE OF LICENSING AND REGISTRATION ................................................................................................... 4 QUICK START MAIN FEATURES .................................................................................................................... 5 INSERTION AND REMOVAL......................................................................................................................... 5 AUTO SHOW OF MISTAKES ....................................................................................................................... 7 NOTES ................................................................................................................................................... 7 USING THE DATABASE OF SUDOKU BOARDS................................................................................................. 9 GENERATION OF NEW PUZZLES................................................................................................................ 10 TIPS AND AUTO-SOLUTION...................................................................................................................... 11 BOOKMARKS ......................................................................................................................................... 12 SAVING AND LOADING FROM THE FILE ...................................................................................................... 12 PRINTING.............................................................................................................................................. 14 EDITING YOUR OWN BOARD .................................................................................................................... 15 ADDITIONAL FUNCTIONALITY ....................................................................................................................... 17 GAME PANEL ........................................................................................................................................ 17 NEW PANEL .......................................................................................................................................... 19 EDIT PANEL ........................................................................................................................................... 19 FILE PANEL............................................................................................................................................ 19 SETTINGS PANEL .................................................................................................................................... 19 HELP PANEL .......................................................................................................................................... 21

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CAPABILITIES OF SUDOKU TUTOR 1.0

Sudoku Tutor 1.0 is an excellent program for both beginners and advanced puzzle enthusiasts. Novice players will find here tips on how to cope with the first difficulties and learn basic techniques of solving Sudoku. They will be able to start with the boards of small sizes (4x4, 6x6, 8x8), so as to gradually discover the secrets of the game. More advanced players can enjoy a traditional 9x9 boards with varying degrees of difficulty. For the most demanding players Sudoku Tutor offers boards of sizes 10x10, 12x12, 14x14, 15x5, 16x6, 18x18, 20x20, 21x21, 22x22, 24x24, and - for the bravest - 25x25. No matter how advanced player you are, the assistance offered by Sudoku Tutor at solving sudoku puzzles is always useful. Sudoku Tutor can be used as a tool to automatically solve Sudoku puzzles, which are difficult for you. Moreover, Sudoku Tutor provides not only solutions but also shows how to reach it step by step, explaining every move. This is due to a number of logical techniques for solving Sudoku which are implemented in Sudoku Tutor. This distinguishes it from other Sudoku solvers, which provide a solution, but do not explain how you can get to it yourself. Sudoku Tutor will show you how to use simple and advanced techniques, so that your skills are still growing. Sudoku Tutor 1.0 capabilities include: An access to a base of thousands of generated sudoku puzzles of sizes: 4x4, 6x6, 8x8, 9x9, 10x10, 12x12, 14x14, 15x5, 16x6, 18x18, 20x20, 21x21, 22x22, 24x24 and 25x25. Generation of new sudoku puzzles of a given size and degree of difficulty. Finding solutions for the puzzles that you provide A system o visual hints based on logical methods of searching for the solution Finding and explaining all the steps leading to the solution A system of automatic notes Saving any number of bookmarks which allow you to save the current state of the game and restore it later easily Saving a game in a file and loading it later with all the bookmarks and notes. Printing a given sudoku board in order to solve it in a more traditional way with a pencil

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INSTALLATION AND START-UP

To enjoy the fullness of the capabilities of Sudoku Tutor you should: 1. Download the Sudoku Tutor 1.0 installer from www.sudokututor.com 2. Run the installer, accept the license terms and follow the subsequent instructions. 3. Buy and enter the license number. Once installed, you can try Sudoku Tutor 1.0 for 10 hours. All features are enabled. The only limitation is the ability to print only 5 sudoku puzzles. The full version does not have this restriction.

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PURCHASE OF LICENSING AND REGISTRATION

To activate Sudoku Tutor 1.0 you need to buy a license. For the current price and detailed instructions, see www.sudokututor.com. You can purchase a license in a very convenient way by means of the secure electronic payment systems. License number will be sent to your email address immediately after we receive the confirmation of your payment. After receiving the license key enter your personal details and the license number by opening a window "Register" under "Help" (Figure 1). Be sure to use exactly the same data which have been given by you when you purchased a license. They have been used to generate the license number for you. The license number will not work for any other personal data.

Figure 1 Activation of Sudoku Tutor 1.0

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QUICK START MAIN FEATURES

When you start Sudoku Tutor you can start playing at once. Figure 2 shows an example of the puzzle that appears after starting the program.

Figure 2 A sample sudoku board

INSERTION AND REMOVAL

To insert a value of your choice into an empty cell, just click on this cell and confirm your choice (see Figure 3 and 4). If you change your mind - press "Close". Click again at the filled cell to clear this cell or change its value. The original values cannot be changed during the course of solving sudoku, but you can edit the board in the "Edit" panel.

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Figure 3 Click the cell to insert a value

Figure 4 Inserted values differ with the color from the values of the original board. Original values cannot be changed during the course of solving (but you can edit the board in the "Edit" panel)

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AUTO SHOW OF MISTAKES

If you make a mistake while solving a puzzle and it leads to contradictions, Sudoku Tutor will show you your mistake and explain in the text box what is wrong on your board (Figure 5). You can disable this functionality in a "Settings" panel.

Figure 5 Auto-show of mistakes

NOTES
You can save your notes in the empty cell, so that in the future it will help you to find the solution. For example, if you come to the conclusion that in a given cell there may be only 7 or 8, but still do not know which of them ultimately there should be, right click on this cell and choose which values you want to remember in this field (Figures 6 and 7). To remove the value from the notes, click on it again. You can also delete all the notes from the cell by clicking on the area displaying the selected values on the dialog box.

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Figure 6 Making your own notes (click with right mouse button)

Figure 7 Remembered notes

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www.sudokututor.com You can also use the system of automated notes updated each time you change something on your board. To do this, select "Auto" in the area "Notes" in the "Game" panel (Figure 8).

Figure 8 System of automated notes

USING THE DATABASE OF SUDOKU BOARDS

In the "New" panel you will find a huge number of sudoku puzzles that are waiting to be solved by you. Select the difficulty level, the size of the board and then press the "Random" button or search the database using the arrow buttons. You can also enter a specific number of the puzzle from the database and click "Go to ..." (Figure 9).

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Figure 9 There are thousands of sudoku puzzles waiting for you in the Sudoku Tutor database

GENERATION OF NEW PUZZLES

You can also generate new, unique sudoku puzzles for yourself. You can choose the level of difficulty and the size. For example, in Figure 10, a newly generated sudoku of size 12x12 is shown.

Figure 10 You can generate new, unique puzzles with the given size and difficulty level

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TIPS AND AUTO-SOLUTION

If you have troubles Sudoku Tutor may give you a tip about your next move. In the "Game" panel press "Tip" to get an indication of one empty cell without its fulfillment. Figure 11 shows how Sudoku Tutor tells you what the value should be in the cell marked as green - taking into account all the blue cells it shows that the only possible value in the cell marked as green is 9. If you still do not know what to insert in the appropriate cell, press "Next move" and Sudoku Tutor will fill the cell for you and also write an explanation in the upper right area of the window (Figure 12).

Figure 11 Visual tips will help you when you do not know the next move

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Figure 12 Sudoku Tutor not only shows you the next move but also explains why there should be such a value inserted

BOOKMARKS
In the "Game" panel you will also find the opportunity to remember the current state of the game. Look at "Bookmarks". Simply click "Add Bookmark" at any time. Play on, and then go back at any time to your saved game by selecting the appropriate tab and clicking "Restore Bookmark. Be careful! Bookmarks are assigned to the given board. If you change the board without saving your game to the file first, you will lose the bookmarks.

SAVING AND LOADING FROM THE FILE

In the "File" panel you will find the "Save" button (Figure 13). It will allow you to save your puzzle with all the bookmarks and notes to a file. You can return to it whenever you want using the "Load" button and continue with solving it.

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Figure 13 Saving the board with all the bookmarks and notes

Sudoku Tutor saves these files with the extension .sudoku. You can read them by clicking on the file in explorer, provided that the files of this type are associated with the program Sudoku Tutor. If Sudoku Tutor previously did not get permission to make this association, you can do so by clicking on the button "Use for.sudoku files" in the "Settings" panel (Figure 14). Attention! Windows Vista and Windows 7 users: Sudoku Tutor must be running in Administrator mode in order to complete the task.

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Figure 14 Making Sudoku Tutor the default program for opening .sudoku files

PRINTING
In the "File" panel you will find the "Print" button that lets you print out the current board, if you prefer to solve it using a traditional pencil (Figure 15). Trial version allows you to print only a limited number of puzzles.

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Figure 15 Printing the board each board can be printed in order to be solved with a pencil

EDITING YOUR OWN BOARD

In the "Edit" panel you can start editing your own sudoku board (Figure 16). You can add or delete the original values of the board in all fields, create your own sudoku game board starting from an empty one or fully filled by Sudoku Tutor ("Random" button). You can also enter a puzzle found in a newspaper or received from friends and use Sudoku Tutor to find its solution.

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Figure 16 Edition mode use Sudoku Tutor to design your own sudoku puzzle or enter a puzzle fund in a newspaper or received from friends and use Sudoku Tutor to find the solution

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ADDITIONAL FUNCTIONALITY
GAME PANEL
At any time you can ask Sudoku Tutor to show the solution by clicking the "Solution" button. If you do not want to use your notes, select "Empty" in the "Notes" area. Your personal notes will not be erased, you can always go back to them by selecting "User" in the "Notes" area. By clicking the "Copy notes" button, you can copy the contents of the Auto notes to the User notes. However, after any change to the board user notes will not be re-synchronized with the auto notes, so it is your responsibility to care for their timeliness. Click "Check" to check whether your puzzle is solved. If you want to start from the beginning, click "Clear". Your bookmarks are not forgotten, so after clearing the board, you can revert to the game, provided that previously you saved it as a bookmark. For large panels notes are not always visible - especially on small monitors. Therefore, when you point to a field containing the notes, they are also displayed on the "Game" panel (Figure 17). Use a grid of possible values at the bottom of the "Game" panel and select the value that interests you - Sudoku Tutor will mark all of the occurrences of this value on the board (Figure 18)

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Figure 17 Notes in the cell with the mouse cursor on it are additionally displayed in the area of the Game panel

Figure 18 Sudoku Tutor will mark all the occurrences of the value selected by you

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NEW PANEL
If you select "Empty" as the level of difficulty you will get a blank board that you can edit in the "Edit" panel. If you select "Full" as the level of difficulty you will get fully solved Sudoku puzzle. That board also can be used to design your own puzzle.

EDIT PANEL
When editing the board the automatic error checking is still working, which can help you with flawless design of your own puzzle. Your board will not be accepted if they are any obvious errors and contradictions.

FILE PANEL
Remember that instead of using the "Load" button, you can click on the file with extension .sudoku, if you previously saved a game into it. For this functionality to work, Sudoku Tutor must be the default program used by Windows to open .sudoku files. If during the first run of Sudoku Tutor this setting was not done, you can always do it in the Settings panel. Windows Vista and Windows 7 users must start Sudoku Tutor in Administrator mode to perform this operation.

SETTINGS PANEL
In Settings panel you can: Enable / disable full screen mode Enable / disable automatic errors checking Enable / disable writing of explanations Switch between Polish and English language. You can also change the format of the presentation of the values in the board. The format can be numbers, letters or digits from 0 to 9 with additional letters replacing the values from 10 upwards. Figures 19, 20 and 21 show the same board, using three ways of presenting the values.

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Figure 19 Values displayed as numbers

Figure 20 Values displayed as letters

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Figure 21 Values displayed as digits from 0 to 9 with additional letters replacing the values from 10 upwards.

HELP PANEL
Clicking on "Help" will run a video demonstration in your web browser. This demo will present you the main capabilities of Sudoku Tutor. Clicking on "About", and then on www.sudokututor.com will open your web browser and display a web page where you can download the Sudoku Tutor installer and purchase a license in a convenient and secure way (Figure 22). A similar effect you get when you click "Buy license button.

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Figure 22 On the "About" window you can click on a link to the Sudoku Tutor web page where you can
download Sudoku Tutor installer and purchase a license.

When you purchase the license you can activate the full version of Sudoku Tutor by clicking "Register" and entering your personal data and the license number, which will be sent to you in the mail after your make the payment. Remember to provide exactly the same personal data which was given when you purchased the license.

Many successes and a lot of fun while solving sudoku!

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