All about flooble | fun stuff | Get a free chatterbox | Free JavaScript | Avatars    
perplexus dot info

Home > General > Word Problems
Rainbow Triplets (Posted on 2006-12-12) Difficulty: 3 of 5
Twelve nine-letter words, which include a former president of the USA, a state of the USA, and a county in England, have been divided into three-letter groups, producing:


Edu

cON

NeL

quO

oMe

TRE

PeR

Son

jEf

oFF

ErE

thi

inG

iNS

siN

ioN

EtH

kSh

WiS

iRe

YoR

KiL

rOm

oLE

iSe

caT

nCE

Pim

Rti

Mae

tUr

iGN

sPr

Fer

sOV

Lst

Can you work out the twelve words? Pay no attention to the colours of the grid, or to uppercase/lowercase letters!

See The Solution Submitted by Josie Faulkner    
Rating: 4.3750 (8 votes)

Comments: ( Back to comment list | You must be logged in to post comments.)
Solution No Subject | Comment 2 of 8 |

Yorkshire, Jefferson and Wisconsin leap out, as does education.

From there I set the computer running with

DIM pc$(36)
OPEN "triplets.txt" FOR INPUT AS #1

FOR i = 1 TO 36
 LINE INPUT #1, pc$(i)
 pc$(i) = LTRIM$(RTRIM$(LCASE$(pc$(i))))
 PRINT pc$(i); " ";
NEXT
CLOSE

OPEN "\words\words9.txt" FOR BINARY AS #1
w$ = SPACE$(9)
DO
  GET #1, , w$
  IF EOF(1) THEN EXIT DO
  p$ = LEFT$(w$, 3)
  GOSUB check
  IF good THEN
    p$ = RIGHT$(w$, 3)
    GOSUB check
    IF good THEN
      p$ = MID$(w$, 4, 3)
      GOSUB check
      IF good THEN PRINT w$
    END IF
  END IF
LOOP
END

check:
  good = 0
  FOR i = 1 TO 36
    IF p$ = pc$(i) THEN good = 1: EXIT FOR
  NEXT
RETURN

which found

education
insolence
maelstrom
offspring
personnel
pimpernel
sovereign
springing
thirtieth
turquoise

but springing is out as it uses two ing's. Also, personnel and pimpernel cannot both be right as they both use nel and per. But it's personnel that would reuse the son from Jefferson, so pimpernel it is.

That gives us

Jefferson
Yorkshire
Wisconsin
education
insolence
maelstrom
offspring
pimpernel
sovereign
thirtieth
turquoise

That's only 11.  Looking at D's answer, it looks like kilometre is the 12th, and not in my word list, due to its spelling.


  Posted by Charlie on 2006-12-12 14:20:26
Please log in:
Login:
Password:
Remember me:
Sign up! | Forgot password


Search:
Search body:
Forums (0)
Newest Problems
Random Problem
FAQ | About This Site
Site Statistics
New Comments (14)
Unsolved Problems
Top Rated Problems
This month's top
Most Commented On

Chatterbox:
Copyright © 2002 - 2024 by Animus Pactum Consulting. All rights reserved. Privacy Information