Loading Dialog Implemented

We finally got the loading dialog to work properly using a Handler and a separate background thread.  We also uncovered an issue with all dialogs we had in general on orientation change, and were able to handle it accordingly (they needed to be officially dismissed upon Activity onStop so it wouldn't cause window leaks).   Screenshot of progress dialog:

This week we will be continuing work on the User Guide, Installation Guide, and code commenting.

Puzzle dificulty issue has been fixed

The puzzle difficulty issue has been resolved. Puzzles are now being generated at the requested difficulty. As per my previous post, the issue was with the record history flag not being set properly.

This has increased the load time for puzzle generation. A loading screen will be created for the transition.

Generator difficulty issue

Determined why the generator is not providing difficulty. Generator is not providing a difficulty because the arraylist solveInstructions is not being incremented. Further investigation needed to determine why solveInstructions is not being incremented.

Possible cause record history flags not reset.

Also noticed that in our code the when solveInstructions.clear(); is called, it is not incrementing the modCount either. Further investigation needed to determine why modCount is not being incremented.

More Progress

Added pencil mark functionality today, and the generator will pass a puzzle of whatever difficulty it generates to the activity.  The problem with the generator at this point is if we ask it for a puzzle of a certain difficulty, we have to put it in a loop until it gives us one with that difficulty, and what it does is it keeps generating and then coming back with "unknown" difficulty and continuously regenerates.  We decided to look at it and see if it was generating anything useful at all, and it was, so we put it out to the puzzle screen.  We will be doing some more reading on the generator and its difficulty ratings.  Other things we are looking at next are to gray out buttons when the digit count on the puzzle board reaches 9 and begin looking into the timer functionality.

Potential generator found

A potential generator has been found from http://ostermiller.org/qqwing/. The following features are listed on the website:

• Fast. It can solve 1000 puzzles in 1 second and generate 1000 puzzles in 25 seconds.
• Uses logic. Uses as many solve techniques as possible when solving puzzles rather than guessing.
• Rates puzzles. Most generators don't give an indication of the difficulty of a Sudoku puzzle. QQwing does.
• Can print solve instructions. Tells steps that need to be taken to solve any puzzle.
• Customizable output style. Including a CSV style that is easy to import into a database.