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Short reading on how nonograms work — the rules, the line-solving moves that resolve every puzzle at the easier tiers, and the techniques that carry you through the harder ones.
Recent articles
A short history of the nonogram
Non Ishida's first grids, James Dalgety's name, the late-eighties fax-machine year that made them international, and why one form has so many names.
3 min read
Choosing your first puzzle
5×5 easy is a pleasant minute, and starting there is more useful than you'd think — even if you've solved logic puzzles before. Here's why.
3 min read
Common mistakes (and how to recover)
Four things every nonogram solver does wrong at least once — including the one that produces a puzzle that looks finished but isn't.
3 min read
Japanese vs Western traditions
Same logic, different defaults. What hanjie, picross, griddlers, and paint-by-numbers actually share, and the small differences in how they're set.
3 min read
Line-solving fundamentals
The single move that resolves most easy nonograms — and a precise account of why it works, with the arithmetic that lets you read it off any line.
3 min read
All articles
Picture nonograms vs pure logic
The same grid, the same clue numbers, two ways of playing. One uses the picture as a hint; one refuses to. There are good reasons to do either.
3 min read
Reading the edges
Why the corners and the long single runs give themselves away first, and a short procedure for sweeping the borders of any nonogram before you do anything else.
3 min read
The contradiction move
When line-solving stops paying out and you have to look at a single cell across two lines at once. The technique that turns hard puzzles tractable.
3 min read
The rules of nonograms
How nonograms work, in five paragraphs. The grid, the clue numbers, the only two things a cell can be, and the one rule that holds it all together.
2 min read
Training your eye for runs
The pattern recognition that turns hard nonograms tractable. The shapes you'll start spotting once you've solved a few dozen, and what to look for in the meantime.
3 min read
When to mark an X
Cross-marks don't solve anything — they're bookkeeping. Worth doing well, because eliminated cells are cells you won't spend the rest of the puzzle reconsidering.
2 min read