Rules

Objective

The objective of Euler's day off is to rearrange 25 pre-selected letters in a five-by-five square to form as many vertical and horizontal words as possible.

Scoring

The score for any given solution is equal to the number of letters in the vertical words plus the number of letters in the horizontal words. Only one word may be claimed per line, and only those words that you enter in the submission form will contribute to your score. The maximum score is 50, which can be obtained by rearranging the letters to form five five-letter vertical words and five five-letter horizontal words.

Word Validity

Words must meet all of the following criteria to be considered as valid:

1. Words must have three or more letters.
2. Words must either read horizontally from left to right or vertically from top to bottom.
3. Words must be in the Euler's day off dictionary (see below).

Solution Ranking

Euler's day off is only for fun. However, every day an example of one of the maximum-scoring solutions will be displayed for the previous day's puzzle. An indication of the puzzle difficulty will also be provided based on the solutions submitted. Results for a puzzle will posted as soon as it has expired, i.e. 9pm UK time.

Puzzle expiry

A new puzzle is set at 9pm UK time each day. If you do not complete the solution submission process before this time, your solution for that day will be rejected.

The Dictionary

There is no such thing as a definitive dictionary because everybody has a slightly different idea about what should be included. The following hints provide a guide as to what is, and what isn't, included in the Euler's day off dictionary:

1. The dictionary contains English words, and includes British, Australian and North American spellings.
2. The following types of words are not generally included:
   1. Proper nouns, such as "John" or "London".
   2. Most abbreviations, including acronyms, truncations and contractions, e.g. "BBC", "NATO", "dept.", and "can't".
   3. Vulgar or offensive words - we have removed these to keep the website family friendly.
3. The dictionary does include abbreviations that have become a part of every day language, e.g. "fax" and "photo", and some foreign words that are commonly used by English speakers, e.g. "ciao" and "nada".

English is spoken as a first language by over 375 million people, and has official or special status in at least seventy five countries. The Euler's day off dictionary is inclusive, rather than exclusive in nature. Please don't be surprised if you see the odd word in other people's solutions that you don't recognise!