Make sure there isn't a big gap between the crossword grid and the clues. Also make sure that when resizing, the grid remains on the frame and the clues get squashed out but without moving away from the grid.

There is seemingly a bug where the letters which are generated between the words will not change background colour when the mouse is clicked. I have no idea why. (Probably something obvious and stupid I've done)
This is in DrawWordSearch class.

Good luck!

Create an 'expert' option for the word search which allows words to snake around in any direction.
(Had this mostly implemented but it contained a few bugs.)

Allow the user to press on a button to give a hint to each clue. This would be an anagram of the word itself.

Allow the user to press backspace to navigate to previous menu screen.

Allow the wordsearch words (clues) to be listed in more than one column (vertically to right of the grid) so that the overall height is the same as the grid.

Try to implement diagonal clues and backword clues for all down, across and diagonals as well.

Make the crossword GUI look modern, nice and usable. Think about the use and positioning of buttons, labels etc. Think about rounded edges, shadows, fonts, backgrounds etc.

Could try to implement method to add outlined border to font by using imported method.

Alternatively (easier and hackier) just use JLayeredPane to put two identical labels, with text in one emboldended and both transparent.

Need to ensure that when the solutions for the various puzzles are shown, pressing the 'x' in the top right corner has the same effect as pressing the 'hide solution' button. In other words it makes the crossword text go back to normal.

I tried to get this thing going and encountered the following error:

java.io.FileNotFoundException: words_cambridge.txt (No such file or directory)

My guess is that you have this file, and the repository doesn't?

There are many reasons not to but binaries on your repository.
This is one of them:
https://robinwinslow.uk/2013/06/11/dont-ever-commit-binary-files-to-git/

Of course it is up to you whether you want to remove them or not.

Some classes have zero comments. Write proper code documentation: comments, method explanations etc. Very important if we're collaborating and I want to edit/play with what you've done!

Add method for users to highlighting the words (and also how to display the solutions).
Before implementing something, let's discuss here the best way we think we can do this, since there are a few different options.

This issue is where we will put all our most ambitious, unrealistic or difficult plans.
1.
2. Allow user to swipe puzzle left, so that it rotates a cube to the adjacent face to show the previously saved puzzle.

• Allow user to swipe down to rotate through the puzzle types, swiping down would always cycle through the most recently worked on puzzles in each category eg: crossword #2->sudoku #3 -> wordsearch #4 -> crossword #2 again etc...
• Allow user to swipe up to remove (delete) current puzzle. It could bring a pop up notification to allow the user to confirm they want to get rid of the current puzzle. Once confirmed, the next most recent puzzle would rotate into place.
  (Design like certain android UI features like getting rid of home screen tab)

• We could include text-to-speech functionalities e.g. a voice reads out correctly identified words. Or could read out questions and then the letters already identified. (This could allow people to do the crossword without having to read, say when driving [probably not the best example], or for people with eyesight problems.
• Related to the last issue, we could voice-recognition functionalities e.g. so that you can say a word to insert into the crossword. This could work hand in hand with the text-to-speech, allowing a user to complete a crossword by listening and speaking into a device, so it could be running when the screen is off say.

Allow user to ctrl+scroll (pinch and zoom on mobiles) to resize the whole grid of the puzzle. This would allow users to see the entire grid or easily recentre on the part they want.

I noticed that one of the clues contained "£1.05" in it, but the £ symbol is not handled correctly.

Also need to test the encoding with Spanish wordlists: can we easily use é,á,í,ñ, etc... in both clues + crossword?

Create proper folders and hierarchies of files in the project so that it is easier to use when more complex and expanded.

More precisely create sub packages in the source folder e.g.

1. Crossword - All crossword related code
2. Wordsearch - All wordsearch related code
3. Sudoku - All sudoku related code
4. GUIs - All GUI classes and related code
5. Resources
6. Algorithms

(Something like this - but think about the most logical and efficient structure)

Allow scrolling in the solutions of crossword and wordsearch. When size is set to ~25+, the solution is bigger than the window and so scrolling would be useful.

When crossword display is not maximized, pressing down key to select text box also causes window to scroll

It's too obvious where words are due to distribution of uncommon letters around them. This is a quick fix to make the random filler string include a realistic distribution of letters.

Create round edged rectangular shapes in highlighted colour to distinguish correct words from the rest of the grid when the user selects those letters or when the solution is shown.

Improve existing algorithms to allow for 40+ grid sizes in < 1s.

Separate classes for fitting procedures in wordsearches and crosswords.

The original crossword procedure is designed to avoid things like adjacent words (since then we'd have multiple adjacent white squares that did not form a word) and is thus overly restrictive: in a wordsearch we don't care if 2 words are side by side.

This will make it easier to specifically modify for diagonal/backwards words in wordsearches.

Implication: highlighting all words in same colour in the solution will make it tricky to distinguish words. Either need to choose different colours for different words or use something like loops / lines to highlight them.

We can set a number of words to fit depending on size of grid.

Implement a method of removing numbers from the completed sudoku grid to generate the actual puzzle.
Research online to find different ways of doing this, try different methods for different difficulties.
May nee Heuristics and more complex algorithms.

I have never seen wordsearches with circles. I find it visually confusing and would prefer just a blank background with the letters as is normal. What do you think, Andy?

Change around the GUIs to show the completed grid as the solution rather than the puzzle.

Add Steve's original comments back into the correct places for the algorithm classes.
Try to make it look nice!

Allow the user to select other boxes easily by using the arrow keys, or when typing a letter the cursor should move to the next available box.
When deleting, the text should be removed from subsequent boxes. If there is no word across but a word down, the cursor should jump to the next textfield down.

Currently, words can exist which are subsets of other larger words. This will not do!
(I had a wordsearch with WACKY and CAW which were using the same letters.)

When entering text on the crossword grid, the backspace button produces a 'dinging' sound (a sort of notification sound) which is incredibly annoying.
We must remove it at all costs...

If we select totally random word lengths we end up getting too many 3 letter words. If we always fit the largest possible, the wordsearch looks a little odd.

Play with some weighting factor until they look good.

Once the completed sudoku is (successfully) generated, an error is thrown up due to imperfect calling of methods and looping.

Try just forcing the offending value to be outside the error once the check for a complete grid has been met.

Make it so that we can always move the cursor in any direction to the nearest textfield.

Also add periodic BCs so that if we're on an edge the cursor appears on the opposite side.

Save correctly inputted user data to a SQL database.
This will allow users to log back in and eventually load saved puzzles etc.

Add lengths of words to end of clues in form (xx).

Make the hints have a unique anagram which doesn't disappear on mouse exiting the label area.
The randomised anagram should be checked against the original word so that it does not just show the solution.

Add a feature to score out the word on the list with strike-through text when the correct word is identified on the grid by the user.

Add in basic functionality for a wordsearch using the same algorithms from the crossword.

• Don't need to check if grid is connected
• Can use random letters to fill spaces
• Do we need to save random letters to show in solution

Currently WordSearchGenerator.java has a "num_words_to_fit" variable.

Find a good way of choose the number of words depending on the size of the grid.

Show the border for each 3x3 grid more clearly in the sudoku GUI.

Alphabetise the words along the side of the grid so that it is more easy to read and find the word you are looking at. (Or order them in some other way.)

This would be a method to take all the meta data about the current puzzle, including the user's inputted letters/answers so far, and save them for later use.

• This could have a maximum size, say 10 open puzzles for each type.
• There could be a method to save any given data to a file under a folder named after the user. This would be created when the user successfully signs up.
• There could be a similar method to run through the saved data to show the current puzzle.
• Perhaps this should have a heap like structure, so that you know the most recent puzzles looked at - push/pop actions.
• The data could sporadically be saved to a database so that it is able to be recalled at a later date, or if the user removes the data from their own device.

Add that a mouse click on first letter of a word highlights the corresponding spaces in light blue. Second click will highlight a "down" word if there is one beginning from this same square.

Count clicks and just use even/odd numbers to distinguish?

Also, when alternating like this between across/down, we can flip the prioritisation so that if a down word is highlighted the cursor now favours down rather than across.

Could add various difficulty options: "Easy" might only include down and across words, "medium" diagonal and back, "hard" backwards-diagonal too.

Maybe number of words too?

Ideas?

Generate wordlists and vocab sets for various languages.

I have a script that will translate files from English to any language using Google translate. (Check terms of use: is this legal?)

Vocab set ideas: animals, food, places, household objects, body parts, nature, countries, verbs, sports, emotions and feelings, clothing

Possible issue: are non-standard characters á, é, í, ó, ü, ñ dealt with OK?