Sam Loyd's math puzzle #279
This is 279th puzzle from the book Mathematical Puzzles by Sam Loyd .
The task of the puzzle is to move all pieces from the source to the target ("to fix them").
The pieces are moved in 2 steps:
- 1st move places a source piece to a target
- 2nd move fixes it
The 2nd move has to be only to a neighbor's neighbor which is shown with lines. For example, (3) piece can be moved to (1) or to (5).
To move a source piece, you can drag-and-drop it. Or just click it, then move to a target and click again. Or click a vacant target.
The puzzle can be run so:
tclsh samloyd279.tcl ?NP?
where NP - number of pieces from 8 to 24, by default 12.
Links
Pictures
The original picture from Sam Loyd's book "Mathematical Puzzles":
and two corresponding screenshots:
What else
The puzzle has two advantages:
- it isn't addictive: you just solve it and that's all
- it can be played anywhere with any pieces, e.g. on a beach with stones
Well, I know the solution, but have no mathematical explanation to it (or an education to the explanation :)
Remarkable is the fact that the puzzle is solved only for an even number of source pieces, odd ones exclude the solution.
Perhaps, searching the mathematical explanation is another sort of puzzle.