Crossword puzzles

About.com - Crossword puzzles, cryptics, logic puzzles, and links to online references for puzzle solving.

Acrostics - Original crossword puzzles of various types. Can download for personal use.

Brenda's Page - Puzzle on page to print and work offline.

Canopia Crosswords - A variety of crosswords along with other word games.

ClueMaster - Word searches and logic puzzles and 2-way crosswords.

The Crossword Centre - Resources provided for crossword puzzles, links, books and software.

Crossword Puzzle Guide - Lists of common crossword answers, biblical names and mythological figures.

Crossword Puzzles - Offers cryptic crossword puzzles, puzzlemaker software, crossword solvers, and dictionaries.

Crossworders - Digital crossword puzzle.

CrosswordLinks.com - A comprehensive crossword puzzle resource with rules and helpful tips, articles, software, forums, and information about leagues, tournaments and online play.

4crosswords - Crossword puzzles, online crosswords, puzzle software and crossword puzzle books are all at 4crosswords.com

Crosswords & Other Word Games - A list of crossword puzzle sites, comic strips, and word-related content.

Crosswords, Word Puzzles and more - Free crossword puzzles available to print out and solve. A new puzzle almost every day.

Crosswordsite - Crossword puzzles in American and British English and styles - quick and cryptic crosswords, graded from easy to hard, for solving online or on paper.

Daily Crossword - ThirdAge offers a new crossword puzzle everyday.

Daily Puzzler - this site has crosswords of many varieties, acrostics, word searches, cryptoquotes, jumbles, trivia, and other mindbenders.

3DCrossword.com - The best game out there for crossword players who are looking for something a little different.

Fantastica Daily -- Crossword Puzzles Weekly - All based on science fiction, fantasy, and/or horror; new puzzle added weekly

Fwend.com Weekly Crossword - A simple, weekly updated, interactive crossword. Easy navigation with mouse or arrow keys.

Globob - Continuous crosswords along with other puzzles to choose from.

Infoplease Weekly Interactive Crossword - A thematic, interactive crossword puzzle from Infoplease.com

It's Cubular - Original cubular crossword puzzle and gift box.

JIW Crossword Puzzle Index - Their are many different categories to choose from along with word searches.

Lovatts Crosswords and Puzzles - Leading Australian publishers of crossword magazines. Play online samples or subscribe.

MacNamara's Band Inc. Crossword Puzzles - Crossword Puzzles by renowned constructor Fred Piscop. Custom puzzles are also available.

Merl Reagle's Sunday Crosswords - Crossword Puzzles.

MSNBC - Crossword - A new puzzle daily. Many past puzzles available.

The New York Times Crosswords & Games - The New York Times Daily Crossword Puzzle with four ways to play, plus free classic crosswords and trivia quizzes. Subscription required.

Oxbrain.com - Illustrated adventure stories with java-based themed crosswords complementing the storyline.

Peter & Penny's - Crossword puzzles, quizzes and books for sale.

Pete's Puzzle Page - Original rock'n roll crossword puzzles. Challenging brain teasers. Fun for music lovers.

Puzzle Buffs International - Featuring books on crosswords as well as online crossword puzzles and word search games.

Puzzle Depot - Find crosswords, riddles and word puzzles, logic and strategy software/board games, and shareware.

Puzzle People - Human produced, not computer-based. Standard, cryptic, clueless, and trivia crosswords.

PuzzleGetter - Utility to download crossword puzzles from various newspapers in AcrossLite format. (for Mac OS X)

The Puzzlemakers Site - Puzzles at all levels of difficulty. Site provides samples.

Scientific Crosswords - A collection of free to download scientific crosswords.

Search Lessons Learned from Crossword Puzzles - Abstract paper by Matthew L. Ginsberg.

Tidbits Puzzles - Features selection of short and small crossword puzzles.

USA Today Crosswords - Crosswords from USA Today. Updated daily.

Weekend Edition Sunday Puzzle - New York Times crossword puzzle editor presents an on-air quiz and gives a challenge for listeners at home.

The World's First Crossword - Read about and solve crossword by Arthur Wynne, first published in the New York World in 1913.

Yahoo Crossword - New puzzles daily, archived for two weeks.

Crossword dictionaries

Amo's Online Crossword Puzzle Dictionary - The Amo dictionary contains more than 170 000 words. Searching on the basis of a sequence of letters and jokers is fast and efficient. Excellent for crossword puzzles.

Crossword Companion - Online aid for solving crossword puzzles.

Crossword Helper - Online aid for solving puzzles.

Crossword Solver - A utility to help with those holes in your crossword puzzle solution.

Crossword Solver and Scrabble Aid - Online tool which provides a list of possible words for given series of letters and blanks, or for a given batch of letters.

Dictionnaire de Mots Croisés - Online French Crossword Puzzle Dictionary.

Ekelundh.Com - Free crossword solver. Fill in known letters to see suggestions from the database.

One Across - Search for answers to you puzzle.

Proper Name Finder - A reference guide for finding proper names of actors, writers, musicians, politicians, award-winners and other celebrities; includes 73,000+ names, titles, and award recipients.

Wordfinder - Online dictionary and synonyms used on crosswords. Available on CD-ROM.

Online crossword puzzles

Anagram Crosswords - Crossword puzzles in which clues are anagrams.

BestCrosswords.com - Free crosswords on a daily basis.

Crosswords - Online crosswords created automatically.

Crosswords and Word Puzzles - Find online crosswords, access software to write your own puzzles. Includes logic problems, palindromes, cryptics, and foreign-language crosswords. From About.com.

iGameFan.com - Online games and activities, specializing in crosswords.

Motor-Cross Automotive Crossword Puzzles - Interactive java crossword puzzles relating to the automotive community.

Thinks.com - Many puzzles to choose from: crosswords, anagrams, doublets, trivia, math and word searches.

Crossword makers

Crossword Compiler   - Create educational and professional crossword puzzles. Create vocabulary puzzles automatically from a word list.

Cruciverbalist   - Crossword construction software for the Macintosh, by West Pole Software.

Across and Across Lite - Literate Systems' crossword solving and construction software.

Bryson Limited - TEA and Sympathy software for solving and compiling crossword puzzles and other word games.

Crossdown Crossword Puzzles - Solve and construct professional crosswords on your Windows computer.

Crossword Compiler - Educational and professional crossword puzzles. Create vocabulary puzzles automatically from a word list.

Crossword Construction Kit 98 - The Desktop Publisher for Crosswords. Features the ability to make puzzles in fun shapes (diamonds, doughnuts, and trains).

Crossword Express - A crossword puzzle compiler for Windows and Macintosh.

Crossword Maestro - Solves cryptic and non-cryptic crossword puzzles with explanations.

Crossword Software Guide - If you are a crossword enthusiast you will find here all the software you need, whether it's for creating crosswords or helping to solve them.

Crossword Studio - Solve puzzles and design your own with this commercial program. Add artwork, color and sound. Use them for your own enjoyment or let others share in the crossword fun.

Crossword Weaver - Easily make crossword puzzles using your words. Two styles of puzzles. Multiple puzzles from the same list. Different difficulty levels.

Crossworks - Crossword puzzle software with the full Merriam-Webster Crossword Puzzle Dictionary.

Henry Casson's Crossword Utility - Free crossword software for the creation of grids and the facility to send grids by email as a text message.

Literate Software Systems Home Page - Get the free Across Lite software, visit the crossword puzzle gallery, and exchange ideas with and meet other crossword enthusiasts in the CrossTalk Lounge.

Nonogram Puzzle - Also called paint by numbers puzzle. Site includes downloads, more than 600 tasks, rules, FAQ, press, puzzle history and game updates. [Russian or English]

Puzzle Express - Puzzle playing shareware software, including crosswords, fill ins, coded crosswords, word search puzzles and logic puzzles.

PuzzLex Crossword Solver - Solves incomplete words, anagrams, multiple word anagrams and countdowns. 200000 word lexicon and over 100000 definitions, synonyms and antonyms.

TEA - Offer tools for creating custom crossword puzzles using own databases or built in clue-answer dictionaries, and export them as HTML or publish them as online game with the Open Source TooHot Java applet.

Word Fit! Crossword Puzzle Generator - Weekly crossword and fill-in puzzles along with a shareware puzzle viewer/generator are available at this site.

Word Wizard by Codasoft - Solves crosswords and anagrams. It includes a wordbase with over 100,000 entries, covering almost all words in the English language with between three and nineteen letters.

Word Works From CL Enterprises - Creates religious word puzzles for all ages.

WordFind: Crossword Help Utility - This utility allows you to search for words based on patterns, wildcards (including voewls, consonants and user-defined criteria); has a vocabulary of 115,000 words. Great for crosswords & Scrabble.

Acrostic puzzles

Acrostic 3.0 - Puzzle creation software.

Acrostics 101 - Double crostics in large GIF format. Files may be awkward to print.

Acrostics Network - Puzzles delivered by snail mail. Subscription required.

Arsinoes - Cryptic crosswords and acrostics with regular or cryptic clues (PDF).

Coaster Crostic - One double crostic (PDF) based on roller coasters.

Crostic puzzle - One double crostic (JPEG).

Double Reed Society - One puzzle (HTML & JPG) for bassonists and oboists.

Dr Owkword's - Double crostics (PDF) based on lyrics from rock, punk and soul music.

E-Crostic Software - Downloadable computer application. With the program comes hundreds of free puzzles by many different creators.

Encyclopedia of Baseball Catchers - One puzzle (HTML) based largely on baseball.

Entry Points - Some double anacrostics (HTML & GIF) and creation software.

Finishing the Hat - Puzzles (HTML & GIF) based on the works of Stephen Sondheim.

Headlines by Kaz - Short puzzles (GIF) based on historical events.

Horn Book - One double crostic (GIFs) based on literature for young adults.

The Looking Glass - One puzzle (HTML) based on children's literature.

Metacrostics - Diabolical puzzles (HTML) with four line rhyming clues.

Mulawa Cryptics - Puzzles (HTML) with cryptic clues.

Pennsylmania - Double crostics (PDF) from University of Pennsylvania.

Phred.org - One double crostic (PDF) and some puzzle solving software.

Pomona College - One double crostic (GIF).

Puzzlecrypt - Cryptic crosswords and acrostics with cryptic clues.

Quote-Acrostics - One puzzle (GIF). Subscription required for more.

Vox Popula - One double crostic (HTML & GIF). Beware of solution at page bottom.

William's College - One double crostic (HTML).

Xword - One puzzle (HTML & GIFs) based on a futuristic novel.

Cryptic crossword puzzles

Ben Robinson's Cryptic Crosswords - A variety of themed cryptic puzzles.

The Crossword Directory - Cryptic puzzle resources - links, book reviews and articles.

Crossword Links - Links to cryptic crossword sites, software and books.

Cullen Crosswords - Cryptic puzzles by Bob Gregory, updated every month

Free Crosswords - Puzzles for download and articles on crossword compiling. Accepts user submissions.

The Globe and Mail: How to do a Cryptic Crossword puzzle - Solution tips.

Independent Cryptic - Daily crossword from the Independent, UK.

Jaques' Cryptic Crosswords - Puzzles by Brian Jaques.

Jim's Cryptic Crossword Collection - A compilation of printable puzzles.

Lexcentrics - Cryptic crosswords and other word games. Pay site, but has a free section with a tutorial and sample puzzles.

Orafusion's Cryptic Crossword - Monthly puzzle and tips on how to solve cryptics.

Peter's Cryptic Crossword Corner - Site includes puzzles for printing, booklist, and a guide for beginners.

Solving Cryptic Crosswords - Tips on deciphering clues.

Susannah's Cryptic Crosswords - Weekly puzzles as featured in the Ottawa Citizen, a Canadian newspaper. Also includes a solver's guide and an anagram service.

Theresa's Cryptic Crosswords - Cryptic crossword puzzles and solving guide.

Val's Cryptic Puzzle Tips - Hints on solving crossword clues.

Webber's Cryptic Crosswords - Puzzles in three formats. Also contains links to software.

Crosswords - history

Crosswords are letter games (and thus a form of mind sport). Modern crosswords take the form of a square grid of black and white squares; the aim is to fill the white squares with letters, forming words reading across and down, by solving clues which yield the words. The black squares (commonly called 'blanks') have no letters, and are used to separate words (all contiguous blocks of white squares spell words). Squares in which words begin are numbered, left to right, top to bottom. The clues are then referred to by these numbers (ambiguities are resolved by the common practice of referring to clues by both number and direction - for example, "1 Across" or "17 Down"); at the end of the clue the total number of letters is given for the convenience of the solver. In almost all cases, the grid is rotationally symmetric.

An example
A small example, to illustrate the format:

Clues

Across

1. Sheep sound (3)
3. Neither liquid nor gas (5)
5. Humour (3)

Down

1. Road passenger transport (3)
2. Permit (5)
4. Shortened form of Dorothy (3)

Scroll down for the solution.....

The solution to this crossword is:

In 1913, Arthur Wynne published a puzzle in the New York World which embodied most of the features of the genre as we know it. This puzzle, which can be seen at this website, is frequently cited as the first crossword puzzle, and Wynne as the inventor.

Crossword puzzles became a regular weekly feature in the World. The first book of crossword puzzles, however, did not appear until 1924, published by Simon and Schuster. The book was an instant hit and crossword puzzles became the craze of 1924.
tradition of pseudonymous compilers

D-Day landings
In 1944, Allied security officers were disturbed by the appearance, in a series of crossword puzzles published in the London Daily Telegraph, of words that happened to be secret code names for military operations. "Utah" (the code name for one of the landing sites) appeared in a puzzle published on May 2nd, 1944. Subsequent puzzles included the words "Omaha" and "Mulberry" (the highly-secret artificial harbors)

On June 2nd, just four days before the invasion, the puzzle included both the words "Neptune" (the naval operations plan) and "Overlord." That was the last straw, and the author of the puzzles, a schoolteacher, was arrested and interrogated. The investigators finally concluded that the appearance of the words was just a coincidence. The event has been so described in histories, and has even been used as an illustration of how seemingly meaningful events can arise out of pure coincidence.

According to National Geographic magazine, though, in 1984 the schoolteacher revealed that one of his students had picked up the words while hanging around army camps. When the teacher had asked his students to provide unusual words as ingredients for his puzzles, he had innocently passed them on.

Notation
A notation has evolved to allow crosswords to be rendered compactly, and enjoyed by the blind or partially sighted.

It consists of giving the locations of the black squares in each row as letters (A=1,B=2, etc.), eg for the example crossword above:

D E
B D E

A B D
A B
Although the numbering scheme could be consistently applied from this information, it is customary to quote the starting square of each clue in (number-letter) format to assist the solver.

Variants
Several variant types of crossword now exist, including:

Cryptic crosswords, in which the clues are puzzles in themselves. Typically, the clue contains an actual definition that is cleverly hidden within another sentence; the remainder of the clue uses wordplay to refer obliquely to portions of the word. For example, in one puzzle by Mel Taub, the word "important" is given the clue "To bring worker into the country may prove significant." The explanation is that to "import" means "to bring into the country;" the "worker" is a worker ant; and "significant" means "important. (One of the frustrations of solving cryptic crosswords is that even after seeing the right answer, it is not always possible to figure out why it is the right answer).

(Cryptic crosswords are not to be confused with cryptograms, a different form of puzzle based on a substitution cipher.)

Barred crosswords, which have no black squares; instead, bold lines between squares indicate word boundaries.

Circular puzzles, with radial and tangential clues.
In 1968 and 1969, composer and lyricist Stephen Sondheim published an astonishingly inventive series of crossword-like puzzles in New York magazine. The Atlantic Monthly regularly features a crossword-like "puzzler" by Emily Cox and Henry Rathvon, which combines cryptic clues with diabolically ingenious variations on the construction of the puzzle itself. In both cases, no two puzzles are alike in construction, and the intent of the puzzle authors seems to be to entertain with novelty, not to establish new variations of the crossword genre.

Attribition: This informational article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia article Crosswords.