CROSSWORDS: Authoring: References

General

see also course sections:
Authoring: Refs: Constructors, Setters/Compilers (Cryptics) -- individual articles/interviews;
Sources: Web Sites: Misc. -- puzzles by various constructors;
Why: Fame: Celebrity;
Solving: Tools, Search, Dictionaries; Refs: Resources, Cryptic, AI
Software dependant advertisers blacklist the crosswords WaPo & keywords; 1/5/2025
Striking ‘NYT’ workers are asking you to skip Wordle -- but they made other games for you to play 11/7/2024
How Crossword Creators Make our Favorite Word Games
interview with Brooke Husic and Natan Last; Atlas Obscura; 5/30/2024
Robyn Weintraub: Creating crosswords BBC; 9/5/2023
A Look Back at 2022 Crossword Constructor Debuts
more than 80 people had their first NYT crosswords published; NYT; 12/31/2022
How I set my first crossword 12/30/2022
How to Make a Killer Crossword Puzzle 11/29/2022
How I Got My Crossword Puzzle Accepted by The New York Times Julian Kwan; SEP; 10/18/2022
How I Crossed Crosswords: Part 1 David Ding; 6/15/2021; Part 2 8/7/2022; Part 3 9/30/2022
Crossword Constructor Resource Guide
Construction Software; Online Dictionaries; Word Lists; Places to Meet Other Constructors;
Publications With Open Submission Guidelines; Other Useful Tools and Websites;
Crossword Blogs and Columns; Inspiration; Puzzle Tournaments; NYT; 11/8/2021
Constuctors reveal the intricacies of how crosswords are designed and the reasons they are so popular
Andrews McMeel Universal editors: Amanda Rafkin & David Steinberg; podcast; 6/22/2021
What's So Great About Writing Crosswords, Anyway? DB; 4/5/2021
Morning Brew Puzzle Creator Job Posting 4/2021
Mars rover’s giant parachute carried a secret message
'dare mighty things' spelled out in binary code on it by crossword-loving engineers; WaPo; 2/24/2021
Across And Down With WSJ Crosswords: Special Live Event on WSJ+: Part 1 Part 2
the Journal's crossword team will dissect the secrets behind crafting WSJ's crossword puzzles; WSJ; 9/9/2020
Working With Words: Inside the New York Times Crossword
video from Edinburgh International Book Festival; 8/23/2020
With wit and guile, puzzle constructors lay out a path for solvers to follow SFC; 4/23/2020
The art of the crossword puzzle 1/9/2020
How to Make Crossword Puzzles paper-oriented; Making a Basic Crossword Puzzle (free-form);
Getting Official (symmetric, standard grid sizes); WikiHow; 11/21/2019
How to Create Your Very Own Crossword Puzzle 3/15/2019
Puzzle: How Many Crossword Puzzles Can You Make? 538; 1/18/2019
New York Times Crossword Contributors to See Pay Raise After Jan. 1 (2019)
1993: $40(weekday), $150(Sun); 2018: $300-450/$1000-1200; 2019: $500-750/$1500-2250;
higher rates for more frequent/reliable contributors; specifications; NYT; 12/18/2018
Making a Crossword; Erik Agard video: 4:57:57; 12/13/2018
NYT Wordplay series: How to Make a Crossword Puzzle: The Series 9/14/2018
Constructing Crosswords Richard Strong Bowen; basic quick intro; QXW authoring tool; 5/9/2018
New Facebook Group Helps Aspiring Constructors Learn the Art of Puzzle Making
Puzzle Collaboration Directory; NYT; 1/10/2018
Will Shortz Explains How a Spiral Puzzle Comes Around NYT; 12/16/2017
For Beginning Constructors Andy Kravitz; 7/7/2017
9 Letters, Starts With C and Ends With D 'Get a Clue! Crossword Construction' class; NYT; 5/6/2017
Cruciverbalism 101 mini 4x4 by Brendan Emmett Quigley and Kurt Andersen; podcast: 12:24; WNYC; 12/21/2016
Your Job May Affect How Your Brain Ages
'crossword puzzle maker' among 43 occupations scored as 'High Cognitive Engagement'; 538; 11/19/2014
How a Crossword Puzzle Gets Made video: 3:32; Mike Vuolo; Slate; 11/12/2014
How Crossword Puzzles Are Really Made Matt Gaffney; MF; 9/10/2014
Senior Crossword Mavens Puzzle NYT Readers
Get a Clue! A Comprehensive Course on Crossword Construction; 1/9/2014
Puzzle Group Draws Up Crosswords to Tease NY Times Readers' Brains JASA; 1/6/2014
How Does the New York Times Create Its Crossword Puzzles? Slate; 11/22/2013
Party Down: 100 Years of the Crossword Puzzle
Deb Amlen, NYT crossword puzzler extraordinaire; Atl; 12/20/2013
How a Crossword Is Made video: 2:25; Will Shortz; NYT; 11/8/2012
Orca Awards: annual (2019-2012) celebration of outstanding achievement in crossword puzzle
construction and editing, with many categories: Best Crossword, Best Clue, Constructor of the Year, ...
Confessions of a Failed Cruciverbalist 1/15/2011
NYT: An 11-Letter Word for Perfectionist? Starts With C 'constructor'; NYT; 12/7/2010
The Art of Crossword Construction Will Johnston; .pdf; 1/26/2010
Become a Crossword Super Solver Will Johnston; .pdf; 1/19/2010
Critique of 'The Crucibervalist'; Rex Parker crossword construction process theme; 2/22/2009
The Ultimate Crossword Smackdown: Who writes better puzzles, humans or computers? Slate; 7/12/2006
Grid Lock: Crossword Puzzles and the Mad Geniuses Who Create Them Matt Gaffney; book review; 2006
What's a 9-Letter Word for an Unusual College Course? Crossword Construction for Fun and Profit; LAT; 1/25/1990
Cruciverb: Sage Advice; Constructing Tips;
Legitimizing Entries; Letting Go; Don't Try to Get Away With Things;
Puns in Crosswords; Beware the Lure of High-Scrabble-Count Letters;
Sparkle; Advice on Making 21 x 21 Puzzles
XWordInfo NYT crossword stats
Solutions from a calendar; Sunday puzzles listed by date with titles;
Puzzles with circles or shaded squares; Rebus puzzles (symbols or multiple letters in a single square);
Puzzles with the longest avg. word length; Unusual symmetry and asymmetry;
Pangrams and puzzles with the fewest letters used;
Scrabble scores: highest daily, lowest daily, highest Sunday, lowest Sunday;
Schrödinger puzzles aka quantum crosswords; Freshness Factor Hall of Fame;
Patrick Berry's 2011 special six-part "Cross" word contest puzzles and solutions;
Eugene T. Maleska's stepquotes; The six 1999 Millennium puzzles;
Will Shortz picks his favorite puzzles and his favorite constructors; Puzzles with comments from Will Shortz;
Puzzles with Notepads or Jim's personal notes;
Jeff Chen's Puzzles of the Week: solve them or view grids with comments or constructors;
The Misenko duplicates; Stats about NYT Puzzle Editors; Messages hidden in clues;
Shortz Era: Most popular answer words; Most popular words by length;
All Fifteen-letter words sorted alphabetically; Even longer words sorted by length;
Debut words in the past month; Debut words by year;
Most answers of each length; Record setting letter counts;
All Time: Most popular words by length; Missing words not found in any puzzles; Random unique words
Editors and Constructors (old) Will Shortz, Rex Parker, Merl Reagle, Stanley Newman
How to Construct a Professional Crossword Puzzle
How to Make a Crossword Puzzle: WonderHowTo; video: 6:23; HowCast; video: 1:15
How to Make a Crossword Puzzle: The Mindset, Rules, Tips My Crossword Maker
Beginner's Guide To Crossword Puzzle Construction Electricka
Crossword Inker: Garson Hamfield. video: 6:45; article
Crossword Construction Wealth Words blog articles; includes: How to Create a Crossword Puzzle -- 6 Simple Steps

AI (Artificial Intelligence)

tools
AIXWORD: A.I. powered crosswords generate words & clues for a free-form crossword about a topic with N words
AmuseLabs PuzzleMe: AI Crossword Generation crisscross entries & clues based on a topic
Aspose
crosswordconstruction.com
Oh, My Dots!
Forget ChatGPT: why researchers now run small AIs on their laptops Nature; 9/16/2024
Optimize crossword layout grids for density WSRP24; 7/2024
Generating a Crossword Puzzle non-AI; 7/18/2024
Automatic crossword generation using LLM Agents source; 6/15/2024
Clue-Instruct: Text-Based Clue Generation for Educational Crossword Puzzles .pdf; 5/25/2024
5 easy ways to run an LLM locally IW; 4/25/2024
A Feast For The AIs? Creating Puzzles In The Age Of ChatGPT 12/20/2023
ArabIcros: AI-Powered Arabic Crossword Puzzle Generation for Educational Applications .pdf; 12/7/2023
Italian Crossword Generator: Enhancing Education through Interactive Word Puzzles .pdf; 12/2/2023
AI Generated Crossword Puzzles Wehar; 6/6/2023
Does Bard know how many times ‘e’ appears in ‘ketchup’? 5/16/2023
Meet Lady Labyrinth, the AI-generated crossword setter Guardian; 3/6/2023
ChatGPT: can artificial intelligence create crosswords?
AI-generated clues are often bizarre and sometimes flat-out wrong -- but, setters agree, that may not be a bad thing; Guard; 2/20/2023
The sticky wordplay test that proves my job is safe ... for now
ChatGPT: cryptic clue for 'marmalade'? 2/8/2023
Puzzle #72: Can We Talk? web, .puz; crosswordnexus; 12/23/2022
ChatGPT's AI can make crossword puzzles, and they're pretty awful web;
Do the words connect? Yes. Will the puzzle make you want to throw brickbats? Also yes; 12/23/2022
Swordsmith fill grid with valid words; source; 4/2022
Write an AI to generate crossword puzzles
CS50: Introduction to Artificial Intelligence with Python; 2022?
Crossword Puzzle Resolution via Monte Carlo Tree Search
Proc. of the 32nd Intl. Conf on Automated Planning and Scheduling (ICAPS); 2022
Automatic Crossword Puzzle Construction AI Generated Crossword Puzzles: article; poster .pdf; 2021
crossword generator code; 2020
Why Crossword Construction is Still Driven by Humans AI vs. theme development, fill; 10/3/2016
Crossword Puzzle Generator Dartmouth Univ.; 3/13/2009
Computer construction of crossword puzzles using precedence relationships
Artificial Intelligence; Volume 7, Issue 1, Pages 1-19; Spring 1976

Clues

Exporting Crossword Clues And Entries: article tool .csv from .puz, .jpz, .ipuz, .cfp
It's Becoming Pretty Clear that the Crossword Constructor Is Going Through Something NYkr; 1/25/2022
Cluer Database App: from Matt Ginsberg; Mac, Win, Lnx; free; standalone app, can be integrated into CrossFire;
no longer updated; last: v3.1.5, 5/9/2023; see xd.saul.pw?
Saul Pwanson's databases xd.saul.pw updated regularly vs. cluer (8/2021); xd-clues.zip
Jeopardy! answers archive
Wikipedia Can Be Both a Gift and a Curse for Puzzlers
one thing can lead to another and down the Wikipedia hole you can go; DB; 8/30/2021
The Anatomy of an Error as a Puzzler
what happens when your mind plays tricks on you when cluing; DB; 7/4/2021
NYT Wordplay series: How to Make a Crossword Puzzle: Part 4
Robyn Weintraub and Brad Wilber clue us in; 7/11/2018;
the submitted puzzle (before editing): web, .pdf, .puz
To Build a Better Crossword The answer is "fashionista." What's the clue? David Remnick talks with
Anna Shechtman and Kameron Austin Collins, two of the crossword constructors who contribute to the recently
launched puzzle on newyorker.com. These experts walk us through the process of devising the perfect clue
for a word that they want to use. Although a crossword puzzle may seem like a slightly anachronistic
feature to launch in 2018, Collins and Shechtman both beg to differ; they are creating puzzles with a
younger and more diverse audience of "solvers" in mind. "I want to see more bands that I like," Collins says.
"I want to see more black people -- black people who aren't Jay-Z or Nas, who are common in
crossword puzzles because of the letter combinations"; podcast: 9:34; WNYC; 6/22/2018
Cruciverb: Why Editors Change Clues
thesaurus.com
wordassociations.net results associated with your input word, not only synonym
rhymezone.com phrases or quotations in which your word appears
The Browser: Cryptic Clue Quiz

Courses

Creating Crossword Puzzles With Brooke Husic & Natan Last $70; AO; 5/24/2022
Crossword Puzzle Constructing Class with Laura Braunstein editor of Inkubator Crosswords; 5/14/2022
The Art of Crossword Construction with Ruth B. Margolin via Zoom; 1/25/2022

Cryptics

Richard E. Maltby Jr.'s Cryptics Harpers; 9/2023
Out of Left Field Joshua Kosman and Henri Picciotto; [ebook] Word Salad: Solving Cryptic Crosswords
Meet Lady Labyrinth, the AI-generated crossword setter interview; Guard; 3/6/2023
Constructing a Cryptic:
#1: Grid Design; #2: Seeding the Grid;
#3: Grid Filling; #4: Clue Writing Stella Zawistowski; Tough as Nails; 4/2022
Actually Setting: The anatomy of a crossword 10/12/2009

Diversity, Inclusivity

NYT constructors (xwordinfo.com): Women, Youngest
Wikipedia: Female constructors
Cluing in to the crossword's political meanings
review of The Riddles of the Sphinx: Inheriting the Feminist History of the Crossword Puzzle by Anna Shechtman; WaPo; 3/29/2024
What Turned Crossword Constructing Into a Boys’ Club?
For decades, the pursuit was identified with first-wave feminists and bored housewives.
How did it come to be defined by a pervasive gender gap? NYkr; 2/18/2024
Rearrangements: Can Crosswords Be More Inclusive?
The puzzles spread from the United States across the globe, but the American crossword
today doesn’t always reflect the linguistic changes that immigration bring;
Mangesh Ghogre; history; NYkr; 12/18/2023
The Latest Western Oppressor? Your Sunday Morning Crossword Puzzle about 'Can Crosswords Be More Inclusive?'; NatRev; 12/18/2023
Can a crossword be racist? 10/17/2019
Apply to the New York Times Diverse Crossword Constructor Fellowship submissions open from Oct. 4 until Nov. 10; NYT; 9/13/2023
A Puzzle Maker Aims to Unite Black Communities in 25 Squares Juliana Pache; NYT; 2/9/2023
A Black Woman Built Community Through Black Culture Crossword Puzzles
Juliana Pache, the creator of Black Crossword, discusses what motivated her to create blackcrossword.com; 1/27/2023
Meet the Second Class of the Diverse Crossword Constructor Fellowship NYT; 1/27/2023
Crossword documentary profiles those pushing for diversity on the page 11/11/2022
Crossword puzzles are everywhere. But how inclusive are the bylines and clues? CBC; 11/6/2022
The fight to change the crossword puzzle is a fight for inclusivity CBC; 10/27/2022
Why I Started Writing Crossword Puzzles what's common knowledge? 10/27/2022
Apply to The New York Times Diverse Crossword Constructor Fellowship
second class of fellows; the fellowship will provide mentorship for new constructors who are women,
people of color or part of the L.G.B.T.Q. community; NYT; 10/24/2022
Tales of America's Black Puzzle Master Timothy Parker; racism? .pdf; 10/2022
Inside the Elite, Underpaid, and Weird World of Crossword Writers
Efforts to diversify the industry might be having the opposite effect.
And although puzzles are an important part of The New York Times' business strategy,
only a handful of people actually make a living from crosswords; NewRep; 8/5/2022
Meet the First Class of Our Diverse Crossword Constructor Fellowship NYT; 4/18/2022
My Journey to Making a Crossword Puzzle That Looks Like Me
how the Expanded Crossword Name Database helps decolonize the puzzle; NYT; 3/15/2022
I'm a Black woman who creates crossword puzzles. That's rare, but it shouldn't be. WaPo; 3/2/2022
For the Love of Crosswords: How the Beloved Puzzle is Reshaping to Reflect Our Modern World La Beauté d'Être; 9/4/2021
Crossword politics 2/25/2021
Crossword Constructors Are Mostly Male. Here's How We Fix That 6/24/2020
Why The NY Times Crossword Dept. Fails at Gender Parity and Tolerance 4/7/2020
The Best Way to Learn How to Make a Crossword Puzzle? Get Yourself a Mentor
Crossword constructors volunteer their time to help underrepresented populations get published; groups, resources; NYT; 1/13/2019
Project for Women-Created Crossword Puzzles Finds All The Right Clues 11/22/2018
A Puzzling Problem: Symbolic annihilation in The New York Times crossword puzzle
...of color, women, and members of the LGBT community; Shane Graber; Journalism Practice;
Volume 13, 2019: Issue 3, pp 383-395; 5/29/2018
Puzzle Trouble: Women and Crosswords in the Age of Autofill 9/2014
Women and Crossword Construction: Part 1: Why the underrepresentation?;
Part 2: The Themeless Situation CF; 3/2014
The Crossword Puzzle: Where'd The Women Go? 8/21/2013

Editors

New York Times Crossword Editors dates, # of puzzles
Meet the man behind the New York Times Mini Crossword video; CBS; 8/20/2024
Puzzle Editor, Digital job posting; NYT; 5/10/2024
Behind the Scenes With Slate's Crossword Editor Quiara Vasquez; 5/3/2024
Will Shortz, New York Times Crossword Editor, Says He Is Recovering From a Stroke NYT; 3/3/2024
Getting to know the Puzzlemaster, Will Shortz NPR; 1/5/2024
A Crossword Anniversary a chat with Will Shortz, who has been editing
The Times's puzzle for 30 years; NYT; 11/26/2023
The Sunday Story: Meeting the Puzzlemaster NPR; podcast; 11/26/2023
Will Shortz's Life as a 'Professional Puzzle Maker' NYT; 11/16/2023
NPR's puzzle master Will Shortz puts the pieces of his life together for us NPR; 11/12/2023
Meet Amanda Rafkin, USA TODAY's new piano-playing, game-collecting crossword puzzle editor UT; 6/16/2023
Christina Iverson newest associate NYT puzzle editor; 3/31/2023
A Knack for Wordplay and Kindness Is Rewarded
Rich Norris, the former editor of the L.A. Times Crossword, will receive the 2023 MEmoRiaL (MERL) Award at ACPT; NYT; 3/30/2023
Will Shortz's Life in Crosswords
his favorite clues, debates in the crossword community, and unexpectedly finding his first serious romance; NYkr; 2/15/2023
Tales of America's Black Puzzle Master Timothy Parker & racism; .pdf; 10/2022
Tribune Content Agency is pleased to announce Patti Varol as editor of the Los Angeles Times Crossword
Christina Iverson asst. editor; Trib; 3/11/2022
The Surprisingly Messy Culture Wars Within The New York Times Crossword Puzzle 1/28/2022
What Editing Crosswords Can Teach Us About Security Leadership
When security leaders look for mistakes, they often find them before customers do;
1. Know Your Audience; 2. See Through the Eyes of Others;
3. Look for Mistakes; 4. Think Long-Term; 5. Learn Through Action; 1/10/2022
Taking the Times Crossword Out for a Test Solve
team of ten testers, fact-checkers and reviewers; NYT; 10/17/2021
How this Jeopardy-winning 'word nerd' is revolutionizing the crossword industry
strives to be inclusive; Erik Agard; USA Today; 10/8/2021
'I’ve outlasted them all': the spectacular life of the world’s most powerful crossword editor
The New York Times’ Will Shortz has appeared on The Simpsons,
written riddles for a Batman villain and sold over 1m copies of a sudoku book.
He talks hate mail, controversial clues and why puzzles are like drugs; Guardian; 7/15/2021
Will Shortz Edits His 10,000th Crossword interview about how he got the job, changes he made;
if Malcolm Gladwell is correct, Will Shortz is finally an expert; WordPlay, NYT; 4/9/2021
The 10,000 Days of Shortz xwordblog.com; 4/5/2021
Introducing the Editorial Director of New York Times Games: Everdeen Mason NYT; 1/31/2021
The Crossword Revolution Is Upon Us Erik Agard; Time; 8/3/2020
Readers say we don’t have a clue interview with Rich Norris; Oreg; 5/17/2020
Puzzling Through Puzzling Times: An Interview With NYT Crossword Editor Will Shortz 4/30/2020
New York Times Crossword Constructors Are Fighting Against its Systemic Bias MB; 4/22/2020
How a Crossword Puzzle Pro Landed His Dream Job Sam Ezersky, associate NYT puzzles editor; 4/8/2020
The Hidden Bigotry of Crosswords The popular puzzles are largely written and edited by older white men,
who dictate what makes it into the grid -- and what is kept out; Atl; 3/18/2020
Grandview students relish day with puzzle master Will Shortz 11/19/2019
I'm Will Shortz, New York Times Crossword Editor, and This Is How I Work LH; 7/31/2019
Reader puzzled over crossword writer change Universal (MailTribune): Steinberg for Parker; MT; 1/8/2019
A Note on Crosswords and Bylines WSJ; 1/17/2019
How to Make a Times Crossword Puzzle
the NYT crossword editors reveal their process for evaluating and editing a puzzle submission; NYT; 12/18/2018
Caleb Madison Meet The Atlantic's New Crossword-Puzzle Guru; 10/22/2018
Will Shortz: A Profile of a Lifelong Puzzle Master NYT; 8/1/2017
Will Shortz: Meet the Puzzle Master! video: 40:50; NYT; 2/7/2017
see also (under Formats): How a File Format led to a Crossword Scandal
Timothy Parker Out as Editor of USA Today/Gannett Crossword NYT; 5/11/2016
USA Today Cuts Ties With Crossword Editor After Plagiarism Scandal NYT; 5/10/2016
Timothy Parker, Accused Of Plagiarism, Is Out As USA Today's Crossword Puzzle Editor 538; 5/10/2016
Major Crossword Publisher Confirms Its Puzzles Were Plagiarized Universal Uclick; 538; 4/29/2016
USA Today Plagiarized My Crossword
my New York Times 7/26/1999 republished in USA Today on 12/7/2004, helpfully titled 'Together Again'
under the byline 'Beverly Gilchrist.' And again by the Universal Press Syndicate on 12/1/2006 under the name
'Carl Cranby'. And yet again in Universal papers on 8/28/2007, this time by 'Gia Kilroy'; Slate; 3/17/2016
USA Today's Embattled Crossword Puzzle Editor Is Stepping Back, For Now 538; 3/7/2016
Questions Raised Over Crosswords Seemingly Copied From The New York Times NYT; 3/5/2016
A Plagiarism Scandal Is Unfolding In The Crossword World 538; 3/4/2016
17 Clues About Puzzlemaster Will Shortz MF; 8/27/2015
On Editing a Crossword step-by-step example; NYT; 12/29/2014
NYT: Talk to The Times: Crossword Editor Will Shortz NYT; 7/19/2009
Few Gnus: The Woman Behind the Crossword-Puzzle Craze Margaret Farrar; New Yorker; 6/13/1959
The ins and outs of crossword puzzle editing Stanley Newman; video: 1:54

File Formats

LitSoft: Across Lite .txt format .pdf
Constructing Crosswords: Formats, Solving Applets
PUZ (crossword puzzles) 5/17/2022
Crossword Embedding Options for browsers
AmuseLabs, Crosshare, Squares.io, CrosswordNexus, Exet, Crossword Compiler; 3/15/2022
No more Across Lite?? XW; 8/2/2021
AcrossLite to Text converter: wiki;
to XML; to JSON Jim Horne; XWordInfo
puz2js
converts binary Across Lite (.puz) files to javascript objects listing title, author, copyright, notepad, and clues/answers
puz2pdf
.ipuz spec
pypuz Python package to read and write crossword files
Stripping solutions from .puz files
methods for restricting vs. locking solution; 9/2021
How a File Format led to a Crossword Scandal
In 2016 I designed a plain-text file format for crossword puzzle data, and then spent a couple of months
building a micro-data-pipeline, scraping tens of thousands of crosswords from various sources.
Then, having all those crosswords in a simple format, I wanted to see if there were any common grid patterns
--and discovered egregious plagiarism by a major crossword editor that had gone on for years.
This talk covers the file format, data pipeline, and the design choices that aided rapid exploration;
the evidence for the scandal, from the initial anomalies to the final damning visualization; and
what it's like for a data project to get 15 seconds of fame; Saul Pwanson;
slides; video: 19:53; 5/19/2019
Details of .puz format
newer version of original Google FileFormat.wiki? 2/19/2018;
formatted orig. version?
convert .ipuz to .puz Python; 1/17/2018
.puz: wiki 2014
Spoonbill Crossword Compiler (.xwc) Format Specification 3/29/2013
Amateur Crypto and Reverse Engineering .puz format; ~2013
Crosswords Go Digital World Wide Web is a 12-letter entry; HTML forms, origin of Across Lite; ~2013
Litzing Methods Using OCR 9/21/2012
Tuning Spork shows how .jpz beats out .puz
"The advantages of .jpz over .puz deserve their own blog post. But in short — the new format will indeed allow
constructors to do things they can’t do now, like shaded squares, bold/italicized clues, unusual numbering schemes, etc.
Basically, just about any puzzle that looks different in print than electronically could look the correct way with a .jpz file"; 4/18/2011
See? I’m telling you, make peace with Puzzle Solver -- alarming Litsoft announcement;
suggested other apps like Puzzle (aka Crossword) Solver and other formats like .jpz, .ipuz ; 4/5/2011;
However, ~9 years later, Across Lite and .puz files are still freely available.
Crossword XML Schema ~2011
Crossword Solver: opened .puz, XML and CC applet files; required Java; 2008-2011 -- superceded by XWord?
Litsoft to be acquired news release: "the availability of free Across Lite software will end at some point" and
"people should no longer look at the .puz format as the means to distribute crosswords except under licensing arrangements"; 4/5/2011
How to create Across (Lite) format files 2010
Avoiding Crossword Applets Python script converts .bin/.ccj to .puz (to avoid Java); 7/24/2009
Eclipse: word list file format (.ewl)

Fill, Dict., Word Lists

The Surprisingly Messy Culture Wars Within The New York Times Crossword Puzzle 1/28/2022
How Word Lists Help -- or Hurt -- Crossword Puzzles NYT; 10/6/2021
Oreos and the Art of Crossword Puzzle Construction
an investigation into 2020's most notorious crossword puzzle clue, told at three levels of complexity; 1/2021
NYT Wordplay series: How to Make a Crossword Puzzle: Part 3
Kevin Der and Paolo Pasco pull back the curtain on the work that goes into filling a crossword
with fun and interesting entries; 6/13/2018
Anagrams: Python script; ducktiles.com
Cruiciverb: Gold Membership ($) access to word lists for CC & CF, and other tools;
Thoughts on Word Lists
The Collaborative Word List Project
other dictionaries tools: Constructing Crosswords: Tools
Crossword Nexus; Alex Boisvert
Acrostic Generator: "The Acrostic Machine"; video: 12:17; 2/7/2022
Algebraic Crossword Script From - To
CrossQuip segments quips
'decoupled-clues' puzzles 5/24/2022
Double Occupancy finds possible theme entries where both parts of each entry can precede or follow a given word
HTML5 Solver intro; open .puz, .jpz; 4/18/2015
JPZ Solver for embedding puzzles 5/16/2015
Puz To NYT Converter pdf suitable for NYT submission
Revealer Crosser
Give us a 15-letter revealer and a list of words.
We'll try to make you a grid in which the words cross the revealer.
Roman Numeral Clues
Snake Charmer
Spiral Puzzles
Submission Checker import .puz, .jpz, .ipuz;
report: Black squares, 3-letter words, Word count, Clue characters, Dupes (word overlaps)
Wikipedia Title(pattern) Search
Expanded Crossword Name Database
Luckystreak Seed Lists Ada Nicolle
Nutrimatic.org: Anagrams (embedded) e.g., "A+>eights<A+"
Puzzles That Need a Home: wordlist Brian Thomas
Quinaplus: Qat multi-matcher: find sets of words that simultaneously satisfy given constraints
Word Matcher free on-line dictionary search
Related Words, e.g., 'dog': relatedwords.org, xwordinfo.com
xd format converter tools
xwd db (saul.pw)
Xwordinfo: Angel ($) access to word lists for CC & CF

Grids

NYT Response to Prior Crossword Swastika Accusations Resurfaces Newsweek; 12/20/2022
Did NY Times Publish What Some Said Was a 'Swastika-Shaped' Crossword Puzzle?
the puzzle's designer said that he was simply going for a "fun whirlpool shape";
NYT: "This is a common crossword design: Many open grids in crosswords have a similar spiral pattern
because of the rules around rotational symmetry and black squares." 12/19/2022
Tutorial: Grid Manipulation 12/6/2022
Tutorial: Stretched Squares 12/5/2022
Tutorial: Blank Squares 12/4/2022
Tutorial: Schrödinger Squares 12/3/2022
How USA Today is changing crossword symmetry 11/20/2021
Hidden Word Puzzles: To Circle or Not to Circle?
earlier reveal for easier puzzles? 7/13/2021
Multigraphs from crossword puzzle grid designs 2021; academic paper
How I Have Fun with Grid Patterns When Building Crossword Puzzles DB; 8/31/2020
Our Crossword Creator Explains the 'Breakout Length' and Why It Makes Crossword Grids So Much Better
6-letter words; DB; 7/20/2020
NYT Wordplay series: How to Make a Crossword Puzzle: Part 2
puzzle makers David Steinberg and Natan Last design a crossword grid around our theme set; 5/11/2018
GridWars Andy Kravis; feedback for new constructors about grids; 12/2019
How Many Crossword Puzzles Can You Make?
15 x 15 grids that obey usual rules?
15 x 15 grids without cheater squares?
21 x 21 grids with and without cheater squares?
538: Riddler Classic; 1/18/2019
Solution: short answer: 404,139,015,237,875; details
Make Your Own Crossword Grid cryptic; 10/15/2009
Why are crossword puzzles symmetrical? 5/11/1984
XWordInfo NYT crossword stats
Grids with the fewest blocks and most blocks; Grids with the fewest words and most words;
Most wide open grids; Record stacks and some notable 15s; Grids with unchecked squares;
Grids with no short answers or with very short answers; Grids with repeated answer words;
Uniclue puzzles; Oddly shaped or sized grids; Most common grid patterns; Grid Art
Cruciverb $; find grids by theme entry lengths;
A Few Words About Blocks
Cryptics: Grid Construction
GridSearch search NYT grids (using XWordInfo) by grid pattern
Grid Libraries mostly cryptic, some American grids; no .puz export;
export to .txt, .xml (for Crossword Compiler)
CrosswordGrids.com
common grid examples: 11 x 11, 13 x 13, 15 x 15, 17 x 17, 19 x 19, 21 x 21, 23 x 23
7 x 7 grids
xd.saul.pw: comparison of 75022 published crossword grids
Universal Sunday Crossword Grid Art 21x21 examples from Jeff Chen

Publishing

Putting New York Times Games to the Test
meet some of the people who play each game and solve each puzzle
before subscribers see them; NYT; 5/20/2024
Zach Gage's Puzzmo gets acquired (by Hearst) as the newspaper games space heats up Verge; 12/4/2023
"Puzzles pair well with reading the news": Why news outlets are getting into games (again) Nieman; 8/10/2022
New York Times Crossword to Pause Submissions Starting July 1 until 8/1/22; 150-200/week; NYT; 6/1/2022
Opinion | The New York Times Is Becoming Amazon. And That's a Good Thing. 2/4/2022
Every Major Newspaper in The World Has These Dharwad-Made Crosswords. Here’s Why PuzzleMe; 7/8/2021
Meet Everdeen Mason, The Times's first editorial director of Games NYT; 5/5/2021
So, How Long Does It Take to Make a Crossword Puzzle Anyway? DB; 2/22/2021
'New York Times' Rebrands 'Crossword' To 'Games' 5/8/2020
To drive daily habits and customer retention, publishers turn to puzzles 2/13/2020
Behind The New York Times Crossword
The NYT Crossword is serious business. Operated like a startup within the company, the NYT Games
Team works tirelessly to keep our 500,000+ subscribers happily solving while driving significant
revenue to support great journalism. With serious solvers comes the need for serious technology.
Since rewriting the entire platform in Go and migrating it to a serverless ecosystem, the Games
Team has driven innovation at The Times with the most cutting edge tools and infrastructure.
Take a behind-the-scenes look of how a puzzle makes it from a constructor to our solvers around
the world and the tech challenges we've had to overcome to enable it. See how we've built our games
platform to handle immense traffic spikes when new puzzles are released, allow us to fearlessly
test in and push changes to production, and quickly launch new games for our subscribers to puzzle over.
talk by Darren McCleary at Strange Loop Conference; video: 39:01; 9/14/2019
The New York Times Co. Reports $709 Million in Digital Revenue for 2018
more than 3.3 million people pay for the company’s digital products, including its news, crossword and food apps; NYT; 2/6/2019
List of Places to Submit Professional Crossword Puzzles NYT (old); WSJ; LAT; others; 10/18/2018
NYT Wordplay series: How to Make a Crossword Puzzle: Part 5
In the final part of this series, the New York Times crossword editors reveal their process for evaluating and
editing a puzzle submission;resources that were mentioned in this series: word lists, software, online resources,
places to go for questions are included in a single list at the end to assist aspiring constructors; 8/17/2018
How to Format Crosswords for Submission to Newspapers 7/14/2018
Real Rules of the Puzzle -- Sunday NYT Crossword Pay Rates 1/11/2014
Solving The Broken Crossword Puzzle Economy puzzle making as an occupation; Awl; 12/7/2012
What is the acceptance rate when submitting a crossword puzzle to the NYT? Quora; 4-7% in 2010 (likely much lower now)
A Cross Business blog; 2010

Rules, Publishing Specs.

Crossword Publication Specs: NYT; Universal; WSJ; LAT;
Newsday; AVC; Fireball, ... -- table from Matthew Stock
Cruciverb: Basic Rules of Crossword Construction (via Will Shortz);
older: Publisher Specifications, Comparison Chart
BarelyBad: Write Your Own; Rules (his): grid, clues&answers; Rules: NYT

Themeless

Cruciverb: What Makes a Good Themeless
The Do's and Don'ts of Creating Themeless Crossword Puzzles 10/22/2018

Themes

Tutorial: Basic Rebus Encoding 12/2/2022
Constructing Analysis #1: Stuffed with Ambition! 10/13/2021
Why the LA Times Won't Accept Your Three-Entry Theme
(and Why You Should Make the Puzzle Anyways) 8/11/2021
NYT Wordplay series: How to Make a Crossword Puzzle: Part 1
two NYT constructors, Ben Tausig and Finn Vigeland, demystify the process of developing a theme set; 4/11/2018
It Themes Somehow Familiar
how could two crossword constructors come up with puzzles that are almost exactly alike?
BRAVE NEW WORLD, INTRAVENOUS DRIP, CONTRAVENE, COBRA VENOM; Slate/ 11/27/2009
Ten bullshit themes
1. the stepquote; 2. Deletion themes that don't make new words;
3. Anagrams of some other entry plus the word ANAGRAM;
4. Randomly circled letters that spell out some kind of word;
5. Random phrases plus entry that's clued {Word that can precede/follow the beginnings/ends of W-, X-, Y, and Z-Across};
6. The same word used as the clue for all the theme entries but in different sense;
equally offending is the one where the clues are gradual beheadings/curtailments/adding a letter;
7. First-words-are-synonyms puzzles; any puzzle whose theme is colors, rhymes, rhymes involving colors,
celebrity's first and last name whose last name is the first of another celebrity;
8. Phrases that contain some repeated two- or three-letter element in the middle of them spanning a word break;
9. The "curriculum vitae" with entry that is clued {Subject of the puzzle};
10. The clue would be something like {Three dogs} and the answer would be a random list; BEQ; 5/6/2009
Cruciverb: Advice on Themes; Theme Entries;
Quote Themes; Theme Types; Theme Advice for Novices

Tools, Resources

NYT Wordplay series: How to Make a Crossword Puzzle: Crossword Constructor Resource Guide
Construction Software; Online Dictionaries; Word Lists; Places to Meet Other Constructors;
Publications With Open Submission Guidelines; Other Useful Tools and Websites; Inspiration;
Puzzle Tournaments; Crossword Blogs and Columns; NYT; 11/8/2021
How the Digital Era Has Changed the Daily Crossword
puzzle design programs, word databases and web searches to help vet an answer:
These are some of the tools that Sam Ezersky, assistant puzzles editor, uses in his job; NYT; 12/5/2018
Play by Play: Moving the NYT Games Platform to GCP With Zero Downtime NYT; 12/6/2017
Moving The New York Times Games Platform to Google App Engine NYT; 8/23/2017
Inside the Box: Crossword Puzzle Constructing in the Computer Age
Crossfire; Crossword Compiler; 9/19/2014
The Best Tools for Creating Crossword Puzzles
amateur: EclipseCrossword; Discovery Educ: Puzzle Maker; dowedo.net;
professional: Crossword Compiler; Crosswordman; 7/22/2012
Designing a Crossword Puzzle in Microsoft Excel .pdf; 9/2010
Crossword Font free, TrueType; preview on site; source: Altsys Fontographer 4.0.4D2 12/16/95
-- for different look/features, search for "crossword" on other font sites
Kotwords: generate .jpz /.pdf from form/.puz for Crossword Nexus solver,
squares.io, XWord, etc.
for these types of puzzles: Acrostic; Around the Bend; Coded; Crossword; Crosswordle;
Eight Tracks; Helter Skelter; Jelly Roll; Labyrinth; Marching Bands; Rows Garden;
Snake Charmer; Spell Weaving; Spiral; Twists and Turns; Two-Tone
Generalisms resources for creating crossword puzzles
Haiku generators: poem-generator.org.uk, writeahaiku.com
Haiku how to write: icreatedaily.com, arthut.org.ng
Helter Skelter; examples
Jack of All Squares: resources
Snake Charmer similar to spiral
Spread the Word List: resources