Hello,
If there are some very very patient individuals who still keep tabs on this blog (and thanks for sticking around), I do plan to make it active again. This doesn’t necessarily mean I’ll start posting puzzles (I have too many other places to submit to these days), but there are some long overdue recaps for WSC-WPC 2015 which I plan to do, after which I’ll also review other contests which happen.
However, I expect all of this to happen only from April. The reason for this is I fell significantly behind schedule with my projects in 2015 for many different reasons, and I’ve been making ground in 2016 to get back to a position where I’m up to date with everything I’m doing. I estimate this to happen by the end of March, after which I’ll have more time for recaps and reviews.
The reason I’m posting this, other than acting as a random update, is to notify the readers about a Puzzle Contest happening this weekend on LMI. Its the 7th round of the ongoing series, Puzzle Ramayan. It is based on Loop puzzles, authored by me. We’ve targeted this tournament for newcomers and beginners, so in this round I’ve spent some time on the Instruction booklet and experimented with providing steps for solving the types appearing on the contest. We’re constantly looking at ways to encourage new solvers to participate, so if you’re new to puzzles and think this is a good way, let us know, by participating! 😉
Contest Submission page with Instruction booklet – http://logicmastersindia.com/PR/201602/
Forum discussion – http://logicmastersindia.com/forum/forums/thread-view.asp?tid=1236
F.A.Q. – http://logicmastersindia.com/forum/forums/thread-view.asp?tid=381
I hope everyone participates and enjoys the contest!
PS's puzzles + 
IB format is a very pleasant surprise, and I feel does a lot to make the contest more welcoming. (Then again, I refer to it as IB, so I may not be the proper person to judge).
It is a pity the good stuff starts on page four, after two very dispiriting full-page walls of text. May I suggest some sort of post-it note stickered to the first page of the pdf, as well as the link to it, advertising existence of worked examples. If you’re going to do the hard work of building handrails, then you may as well make sure they are easy to discover.
This is a good point. Thanks for your thoughts on this. We’ve gone on extending the starting pages with new considerations as we’ve gone through SM and PR, so I think those are essential but I like the idea of a quick link to the examples. I’ll look into it next time, assuming we get some more indication that this is a good thing to continue.
Hi, I have an unrelated question regarding your puzzle in the nytimes magazine section, Rope Threading! I couldn’t find any answers so I thought I’d try the maker of the puzzle himself! I like the puzzle a lot but I don’t understand the answers — there seems to be multiple possible answers of one follows the rules. But am I missing something? In the simple regions, for example, the rope can easily thread through boxes without crossing and without going diagonally. But the answer seems to indicate that there’s only one way to thread. I can’t figure out why one way is better than another. Could you please point me in the direction of the answer? I can’t find it on the internet. I would really like to be able do this puzzle properly. Thank you in advance.
Hello! Sorry for the late response. If possible can you send one of the puzzles where you are getting multiple answers via email to prasanna16391@gmail.com? I don’t think it is right to post them publicly, so I’ll be happy to check on mail. Thanks for reaching out!