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		alanr555
 
 
  Joined: 01 Aug 2005 Posts: 198 Location: Bideford Devon EX39
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				 Posted: Mon Dec 10, 2007 3:24 am    Post subject: Dec 10th - Hard | 
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				This puzzle presents little difficulty if the Mandatory Pairs approach
 
is applied as a preliminary to writing the profiles.
 
 
M/P resolves
 
1 and 7 on row one
 
7, 5, 1 on row three
 
7 and 6 on row four
 
6, 9, 7 on row seven
 
1, 7, 6 on row nine
 
 
Working on the profiles leads to
 
4 in rows two , three, four, five and six
 
9 in rows five and six
 
 
This leaves the 3 exposed in row one
 
and the presence of the M/P marks makes
 
the resolution almost a "write-in".
 
 
In order not to "spoil" the solution, I have not
 
included the cell details but the above should
 
enable anyone wishing to use M/Pairs to gauge
 
progress on applying the methodology.
 
 
As additional hints, the following pairs can be
 
identified in the nine regions - numbering them
 
across first.
 
 
ONE - 3 and 6
 
TWO - 6
 
THREE - 1,4,7,8 (and 2 later)
 
FOUR - 3 (and 9 later)
 
FIVE - 1,2,4,8,9
 
SIX - 4 and 6
 
SEVEN - 1,3,5,6,8,9
 
EIGHT - 1,4,5,7
 
NINE - 3,6,7,9 (and 5 later)
 
 
Incidentally, regions five and seven are examples of
 
"definitionally complete" regions in that ALL of the
 
digits are constrained each to two cells.
 
 
In such cases the M/Pair details become the SAME as
 
the traditional "pencil mark" profiles - and so may be
 
copied from bottom left to top left when the PMs are
 
being derived - another saving on the derivations!
 
 
Rows seven, eight and nine have examples of the
 
"mutual reception" where two digits are each constrained
 
to the same two cells. This is a powerful phenomenon
 
as all other digits are then excluded from those cells. Of
 
course that rule applies also with the pencil mark patterns
 
but is very much clearer with the M/Pairs. As an example:
 
three cells with pairs marked as (123)(23)(1) immediately
 
develop to a definite 1 in the third cell and a mutual reception
 
of 2 and 3 in each of the first two. The exclusion of the 1
 
from the first cell DIRECTLY resolves the third cell. Also,
 
once the mutual reception is identified, it "blocks" the use
 
of those two cells for any other digit - and so can limit the
 
scope for placing other digits in such a way that only two
 
cells (or even less than two!) remain possible placements.
 
The Mutual Reception, thus, can be regarded as being two
 
resolved cells when counting unresolved cells in the region
 
(or on the line if the M/R cells are both in line).
 
 
This puzzle includes a triple in one region. One of the lacks
 
of M/Pairs is that it does not highlight triples or pairs that 
 
cross any regional boundary. The only way to deal with them 
 
is to make a note outside the grid. My convention is to mark
 
the unresolved cells in a line (row or column) as a string of
 
digits within parenthesis eg (1234567) but to highlight a pair
 
or triple by using multiple parenthesis eg (36)(12457) for
 
a pair (either M/Reception or remote) or (247)(1356) in
 
the case of triple. These notes are not available using the
 
on-line version but the large print on A4 is perfect - using the
 
space above the grid and to its right. | 
			 
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