More than fifty thousand solved!

Looks like today we passed a bit of a milestone - just over 50,000 cryptograms have now been successfully solved on Cryptograms.org!

We'll be adding many more new quotes in the weeks ahead, as well as some feature upgrades requested by our members -

- ability to get more hints per puzzle (non-competitive play only)
- ability to get the puzzle answer if you're stumped (non-competitive only)
- improved stats for each puzzle
- improved stats for each player
- customizable "About Me" pages for registered players

Got any other suggestions for us? Just let us know here or by email at admin@cryptograms.org.

Thanks for playing!

- Admin

Cryptograms.org featured by Mumbai Mirror

We got our first press mention (that we know of) today in the Mumbai Mirror. Cryptograms.org was featured in its "Technologies" section. Just a quick paragraph and the url, but hey, no complaints on free press!

Check it out at:
http://www.mumbaimirror.com/nmirror/mmpaper.asp?sectid=16&articleid=72420061531826572420061537953

Rate each cryptogram after you've solved it

We've had a few comments made so far about our cryptograms... mostly positive, but a few were concerned that a certain quote might be too "racy" for all audiences, while others thought some were confusing or possibly had a typo. So we've implemented some new code on the "congratulatory" screen (after you've successfully solved a cryptogram) which now allows each user to share their thoughts on the quote they just revealed.

You'll be able to rate the general difficulty of the cryptogram, as well as make your opinion known on whether the quote was:

- inspirational
- clever or witty
- edgy or offensive
- confusing

... and there's even a box to click if you think there might have been an error of spelling or grammar in the original quote.

You don't need to fill out any or all of these ratings boxes, but it would be a huge help to us if you would take a second or two to make your opinions known. All it takes is a single click, and thanks to AJAX technology, you won't even be taken to a new page (your vote will be tallied and recorded without a page refresh - just like magic!)

Once we've received enough data, this will allow us to provide a more customizable playing environment for our users. Eventually those who want to avoid possibly offensive or adult-oriented quotes will be able to set that as an option. And we'll constantly be keeping tabs on any quotes which might be confusing or have spelling/grammar errors in them. (There's nothing more confounding than trying to solve a cryptogram with a typo in it, I know!)

That's it for tonight!

Stats: 7,563 cryptograms solved successfully to date!

Free cryptogram script for your web site or blog

Two bits of news this evening... first, we hit a bit of a milestone with our five-thousandth solved cryptogram today! Actually, we're now at 5,359 puzzles solved (after launching the site just under two weeks ago) but really, who's counting? ;-)

The other bit of news is a bit more exciting... we've been busy putting together a syndication script which will allow anyone to host a fully interactive, daily cryptogram game on their own blog or web site. You don't need to know a darned thing about javascript, PHP or even HTML for this to work - just copy and paste a small code snippet into any HTML page, and it should work for you lickety split. Your readers will be able to play the puzzle directly on your site, which should help draw in visitors and keep them coming back day after day. Best of all, a brand new puzzle will appear on your site automatically every morning at around 1.00am EST.

Web-geeks like myself can even enclose the script in their own TABLE or DIV tags to control the width, background color, etc.. Technophobes on the other hand can simply copy and paste the code and the puzzle will simply flow into your existing web site design.

In fact I've just added this very code to the template of this blog - see the right-navigation, bottom-ish of any page on this blog. (Note: Blog services such as Blogger don't allow javascript in a blog post, but they do allow you to post this code in the template of your site).

If you think you might like to add a daily cryptogram to your web site, just click here to grab the code and give it a whirl! And if you have any questions or technical problems just drop me an email at admin@cryptograms.org and I'll be happy to help you out.

Happy puzzling!

Comments, questions and suggestions

Hi there. If you're reading this, then by some miracle you've happened to discover www.Cryptograms.org, a new website devoted to one thing - cryptograms, and lots of 'em. They're my favorite kind of puzzle, and to be honest, I'd never seen a site out there that offered pure and simple cryptograms online, solved just the same way as if you were doing it with pencil and paper. They all seemed to have wacky pull-down menus, select boxes, buttons, gadgets and hoo-ha's, none of which were user-friendly and, frankly, it was all just a pain in the rear. So, I thought I'd try my hand at building a cryptogram website which came as close as possible to the experience of solving these puzzles the "old-fashioned way". Cryptograms.org was the result.

So, welcome to the new site and I hope you enjoy your stay. I decided to put together this blog as a means of getting some feedback from those who use the site, and also just as a way to get to know my fellow crypto-puzzlers. If you've got any ideas, criticism, feedback, requests or anything you'd like to share, please feel free to either post it here or email it to me at admin@cryptograms.org.

Other than that, enjoy the puzzles!