ptrks / websudoku_cpp

Scraper for generating valid sudoku puzzles along with solutions from websudoku.

websudoku_cpp

Scraper for generating valid sudoku puzzles along with solutions from websudoku.

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Overview

Websudokucpp is a straightforward web scraper for downloading Sudoku puzzles and solutions from Websudoku.com. Core HTTP request functionality is implemented using the fantastic cpp-httplib header only library.

To scrape puzzles and solutions, websudokucpp simply makes an HTTP request to Websudoku.com and parses the <INPUT NAME="cheat" and <INPUT ID="editmak"> elements from the resulting HTML.

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Building and Running

This project can be built pretty easily - first clone the repo with submodules, then you can make it like any other CMake project.

foo@bar:~$ git clone --recurse-submodules [e-mail]:patrick--/websudoku_cpp.git
foo@bar:~$ mkdir build
foo@bar:~$ cd build
foo@bar:~$ cmake ..
foo@bar:~$ make

Now, you run the example main.cpp file with :

foo@bar:~$ ./websudoku_cpp

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Usage

The default constructor sets difficulty to Puzzle_difficulty::hard.

Websudoku ws = Websudoku();

However, you can also create an instance with a specific difficulty. Options are:

• Puzzle_difficulty::easy
• Puzzle_difficulty::medium
• Puzzle_difficulty::hard
• Puzzle_difficulty::evil

Websudoku ws = Websudoku(Puzzle_difficulty::medium);

You can also update the difficulty at any time with:

ws.set_difficulty_level(Puzzle_difficulty::evil);

To actually generate a puzzle you need to issue a download.

ws.download_new_puzzle();

Alternatively, let's say you want to download a puzzle of a different difficulty level, but don't necessarily want to change the difficulty level of your instance.

ws.download_new_puzzle(Puzzle_difficulty::evil)

Once a puzzle is downloaded, you can print it as a string or write it to a file. Both methods have an optional boolean include_solution flag that prints or write your puzzle along with the solution.

std::cout << "Printing puzzle along with solution: " << ws.to_str(true) << "\n";
std::cout << "Writing puzzle with solution to file: " << "\n";
ws.write_to_file("foo.txt",true);

The output will look like:

9 7 6 - - - 5 8 - 
- - - 4 - 7 6 2 - 
3 - - 5 6 8 7 - - 
- - - - - - 4 - 8 
- 5 - 1 - 4 - 6 - 
6 - 2 - - - - - - 
- - 5 3 8 6 - - 7 
- 1 7 9 - 2 - - - 
- 6 3 - - - 2 9 5 
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9 7 6 2 1 3 5 8 4 
5 8 1 4 9 7 6 2 3 
3 2 4 5 6 8 7 1 9 
1 3 9 6 2 5 4 7 8 
7 5 8 1 3 4 9 6 2 
6 4 2 8 7 9 3 5 1 
2 9 5 3 8 6 1 4 7 
4 1 7 9 5 2 8 3 6 
8 6 3 7 4 1 2 9 5 
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