Talk:List of Sudoku terms and jargon

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This is the Talk page for 'Sudoku terms and jargon'. It is divided into 2 areas: a top summary portion and a lower discussion portion.

1 Summary - Discussion Usage
2 Consensus Summary
3 Discussion Topics
4 To Do

[edit] Summary - Discussion Usage

The talk page is divided into 2 areas. The top area is intended as a consensus summary of the discussed issues. Maintain the summary as you would a Wikipedia page. It should give an clean, easy-to-read summary, structured around the main issues. In a sense, the summary is an abbreviated statement of relevant, general wiki policies as applied here.

The second area is for discussion where the standard talk conventions apply.

(This Usage section could be part of the lead paragraph. It was added so that Usage could be edited without editing the whole Talk page, which can be quite large.)

[edit] Consensus Summary

The topic provides a consensus summary of the discussed issues. Maintain the summary as you would a Wikipedia page. It should give an clean, easy-to-read summary, structured around the main issues. The summary is an applied policy statement.

The wikipedia edit policies are used instead of a voting scheme to establish the consensus summary. The summary should be kept at a summary level. Details and detailed rationale (justifications) should be left in the discussion threads. Since the summary reflects the consensus, edits to the summary do not need to be signed. If (extended) rationale is needed, use the discussion area, where arguments can be signed.

Due to anticipated volume, decisions regarding individual links or terms should not be enumerated in the summary, except possibly as a category of type of links to include/exclude.

[edit] Article Level of Detail and (Br.) Language

The article is list of terms, a glossary with brief descriptions. It should be written at a level of detail understandable by the general user. Refer technical details back to other articles.

Since the main Sudoku article is written with British usage, do the same here. E.g. use analysing style spelling, etc.

[edit] Item Format

(Currently) preferred format to listed items is Name (name translations)[n] - description... Aka: list of names

Where: Name is the most popular name, and name translation gives the english/japanese translation.

For the moment, japanese characters are not included.

[edit] Not a list of links

Links documenting term usage are provided as in-line numbered references (like [1]), but generally not listed in the References section. Only principle references are linked by name or cited in References. The selection of the links is governed by consensus generated here. This is a continuation of the practices used for Sudoku. See Talk:Sudoku for precedence detail.

[edit] Selection of Terms

Terms are selected based on: interest to others, use in other wikipedia articles. To discuss individual terms, use the Terms for Inclusion/Deletion section below.

[edit] Diagrams

Sudoku 9x9

5	3
6
	9	8

	7
1	9	5



	6

8
4
7

	6
8		3
	2

		3
		1
		6

	6


4	1	9
	8

2	8
		5
	7	9

There are diagram templates for the Template:Sudoku 9x9 grid and the Template:Sudoku 3x9 band, which can be used for illustration as needed. See Mathematics of Sudoku for more examples.

[edit] Discussion Topics

Discussion points should be added below. Summary content is maintained above.

[edit] Summary - Discussion Structure Rationale

Many talk pages suffer from the long term effect that there is no way to state the consensus. Any user can read the threads, archives and comments in the main article to build a personal POV as to the state of the discussion, but there is no agreed upon statement of the consensus. As the length of the discussion grows the clarity of the consensus dwindles. (Length can be either in time or text size). The Summary - Discussion breakdown is meant address this issue.

I don't expect a lot of discussion here (initially) but I want to showcase this approach for general consideration. Pointers to similar efforts would be appreciated. -- LarryLACa 21:24, 12 November 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Links for inclusion/deletion

Can be addressed here. At the moment I am community of 1 and will edit the list freely except as debated here. -- LarryLACa 21:24, 12 November 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Terms for inclusion/deletion

Can be addressed here. At the moment I am community of 1 and will edit the list freely except as debated here. -- LarryLACa 21:26, 14 November 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Terms from Sudopedia and SudoCue.net

There is a Sudoku wiki at sudopedia.org - which has the most complete list of solving techniques, terms, guides, software, websites, etc. than any other site I have seen. Note, this site was created by the owner of SudoCue.net and originally populated from the site's solving guide and glossary (the most comprehensive and easy to understand I have ever seen). I was going to add all of the solving techniques and terms from sudopedia, the sudocue glossary, and the sudocue guide to here, but I think it might be too much for a Wikipedia article. Plus they are all laid out differently and many terms are just different names for the same thing. Please post what you think is the best way to go about it. --Lefton4ya (talk) 13:47, 27 May 2008 (UTC) [Revised]

[edit] "Completing the Square"

Completing the square is an algebraic technique with (AFAIK) no application to Sudoku. However, Tom Sheldon in Sudoku Genius, ISBN 0-452-28750-2, has a section on pp. xix-xx headed "Completing the Square", within a super-section "Expert Logic". He applies the term (perhaps intentionally punning on the algebraic term) to an example whose essentials i think i can capture:

In a 9x9, consider three blocks in the same row (or column) of blocks.

Two of the blocks feature a "pair" each.
One number appears in both pairs.
In each block, the cells making up its pair are in separate rows (or columns, respectively).
The two rows (or columns) containing a block's pair are the same for both blocks.
Therefore in the third block, the number that is common to the two pairs must lie in the row (or column) that the pairs do not lie in.

I confess to doing, within the WP articles, zero research on determining whether this technique is described by a different name. IMO, the existing Completing the square article deserves a ToP Dab pointing to an appropriate Sudoku article, e.g.:

This is about the algebra technique; for the Sudoku technique, see Yatta-yatta-yadda.

But IMO it's probably not worth an article of its own, and i don't know where coverage of the Sudoku sense of "completing the square" would belong, so i'm not prepared to place the red-lk in the ToP Dab, in anticipation of someone describing of the technique in a way that is useful to beginners. Suggestions?
--Jerzy•t 04:04, 9 March 2006 (UTC)