Hexakai

Hexakai's Now Faster with a Better UI


Hexakai's puzzle generation algorithm is now 40% faster. I've spent the last few weeks reviewing the algorithm, finding areas of improvement, reducing waste, and performing benchmark comparisons to ensure the optimizations I've made are actually effective (I've discovered one or two that I thought would improve speed but which actually slowed it instead). For puzzles of sizes 10 and under, the algorithm was already almost instantaneous, so these improvements pertain mainly to larger boards with higher difficulties and custom generator patterns. For those playing on older mobile devices, you may see some benefit with more standard puzzles as well.

I've also made some minor improvements to the user interface. The pencil feature, which you can access by long-pressing or right clicking a cell, now includes a button to select all pencil markings and a button to clear them. The pencil feature still works the same, these are just for convenience, as sometimes, it's easier to select everything and deselect a small number than it is to select everything but that small number. I've also resized the value selection, color selection, and pencil selection popups so they are more accessible on smaller devices.

pencil-select-all