Qxw

About Qxw

Qxw is a program to help you create and publish crosswords.

Step 1: create a grid

• Make any shape and size of grid from mini to jumbo
• Create grids with holes and irregular outlines
• Use bars or blocks - or even a mixture of both
• Dozens of types of symmetry including simple rotational symmetry and mirror symmetries as well as ‘left-and-right’ and ‘up-and-down’ types

Step 2: fill it in

• Interactive or fully automatic filling of whole or partial grid
• Use standard plain text dictionary files
• Choose words from the continuously-updated list displayed, or enter one letter at a time
• ‘Hotspot’ feature guides you to the areas of the grid that will be trickiest to fill in, and warns you if the grid becomes impossible to fill
• Statistics window shows distributions of light lengths, checking patters and more, updated as you edit
• Highlight lights violating user-defined checking criteria

Step 3: publish it

• Export the blank grid or the solution grid as EPS (Encapsulated PostScript) suitable for professional publication and easily printed, imported into other documents or converted into other formats
• Export the puzzle or the solution as HTML, ready for you to write the clues using an HTML editor or any text editor
• Export the answer list as a plain text file ready for you to write the clues using your favourite editor
• Save the crossword in Qxw’s native plain text format

How does it work?

(You can get a full-size version of this screenshot and several others here.)

Qxw’s main window is divided into two parts. On the left it shows the grid being constructed, while on the right it shows a list of the words in Qxw’s dictionary that will fit where the cursor (the grey triangle in the grid) points. Clicking on one of these words enters it into the grid; alternatively, you can simply type a word in using the keyboard.

As you build the grid, Qxw continuously attempts to find words that fit. If it turns out that there are only a few possible letters to go in a certain cell, a red square appears to indicate a ‘hotspot’. The fewer alternative letters available, the bigger the red square. This helps guide you to the parts of the grid that will be trickiest to fill in. If there is only one possible letter for a certain square, Qxw automatically adds that letter in grey. The grey letters can be confirmed in the grid with a click of the mouse, eliminating huge amounts of trial and error.

The word list on the right only shows the words that are consistent with the rest of the grid built so far. For example, in the picture above, only five possible words are shown even though there are hundreds of seven-letter words in the dictionary starting with ‘T’. This is because the only across possibility in the third row is ‘ICIER’, forcing an ‘R’ in the third position; in the fourth row, only ‘NODDED’, ‘NODDER’ and ‘NODDLE’ are possible; in the fifth row, only ‘UPSEE’ and ‘UPSET’ are possible; and so on.

Statistics and rules check

A statistics window can be called up at any time. It shows the distribution of light lengths and checking patterns along with other general information. If not dismissed, the window will update dynamically as you edit the grid.

Selection

Any combination of lights and cells can be selected. This can be done via menu items (or their keyboard shortcut equivalents) or by holding down the shift key and clicking on or dragging over the desired cells with the mouse. All letters entered in the selected area can be erased, or the selected area can be used to restrict the scope of the auto fill function (see below).

The selection function can also be used to highlight any lights that violate user-defined checking criteria.

Automatic fill

At any point an ‘auto-fill’ function can be invoked that will attempt to complete the grid. Filling can be either deterministic (always producing the same fill) or randomised (producing a different fill every time). The auto-fill function can be restricted to a selected region of the grid. The auto-fill function is based on the same technology as Crux.

These features make creating a grid a very quick job. A grid like the one above can be constructed and filled in just a couple of minutes.

Preferences

The ‘preferences’ window allows you to configure various aspects of Qxw’s behaviour, including how it defines the notions of over- and under-checking. Preferences are saved in a file in the directory from which Qxw is run.

System requirements

Qxw’s system requirements are modest. It should work on any Linux system with:

• a 386-class or higher processor
• GTK version 2 (which you almost certainly have if you are running a windowing system)
• preferably at least 32 Mbytes RAM beyond that required for your desktop; more if you wish to use larger dictionaries

The program is tested under Ubuntu 6.06 and 6.10. The distributed binary is built under Ubuntu 6.06.

How do I get a copy?

Download here

Examples of crosswords created using the program are welcomed for inclusion in this website; sources will of course be credited.