How to make a crossword
Supply the words and the clues; the generator interlocks them and checks the result is actually complete.
Making a crossword by hand is genuinely hard — the interlocking is the difficult part. Supply word and clue pairs and let the placement be worked out for you.
Step-by-step
- Enter each word with its clue.
- Generate. The words are interlocked into a grid.
- Check the numbering reads sensibly.
- Print, with the solution on its own page.
Every answer gets a clue
The classic failure of an automatic crossword builder is producing a grid containing a word nobody wrote a clue for. It happens when placement creates an unintended word in a crossing direction, and it makes the puzzle unsolvable at that point.
The generator extracts every complete run of letters in the finished grid and checks each one against your clue list. If a run has no clue, the grid is rejected and rebuilt rather than handed to you broken.
Writing clues
- Match part of speech and tense. A plural clue wants a plural answer.
- Do not use the answer in the clue, or any word sharing its root.
- Vary the type. Definitions, examples, fill-in-the-blanks and the occasional pun keep a puzzle from feeling like a vocabulary test.
- Keep them short. Long clues crowd the printed page.
Choosing words that interlock
Words rich in common letters — E, A, R, S, T — interlock readily. A list of words made mostly of J, Q, X and Z will produce a sparse grid with few crossings, and crossings are what make a crossword solvable.
Frequently asked questions
What if a word cannot be placed?
You are told which one rather than having it silently dropped. Usually it shares too few common letters with the rest of the list.
Can it produce a word I did not supply?
The grid is checked for exactly that. Every complete run of letters must correspond to a clue you wrote, or the grid is rebuilt.
How many words do I need?
Around fifteen to thirty works well. Fewer produces a sparse grid with little interlocking; many more becomes hard to place and hard to print.
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