Golf lessons beginning in month six for Tiger Woods (6) Code golf is terrible programming practice AND no one would want to read text written the same way as cryptic crossword clues. Neither makes any sense! But you can learn from both and they tickle one's brain in a way that puzzles often do.
The benefit of both Cryptic crossword clues and code golf is that they are motivating ways to learn the rules of a thing. In Cryptic crosswords you essentially learn the rules of cryptic crosswords while also learning a way to look at the English language at its most flexible. Tiger Woods is the name of a golfer but without the capitalisation it can also be used indicate the habitat of a tiger... not normal woods, but the type of woods in which you'd find a tiger!
Likewise code golf can be a puzzle that helps you to learn the tricks of a language. Do you understand the parsing rules of white space? You will when you want to remove one more character. Do you use the walrus operator? It can save you a whole line! Come along and learn a bit about code golf and a bit about cryptic crosswords and probably get addicted to one or the other.
(The answer was JUNGLE by the way)
“But how was anyone supposed to know that?!” is a phrase I hear often when I try to teach the rules of cryptic crosswords
There are many rules and conventions that govern how a cryptic crossword clue can be decoded. Many of them are kind of fuzzy and the answer to “How was anyone supposed to know that” is, well, experience. So too with code golf. Often, I have looked at others’ solutions to code golf and wondered what craziness was going on in their minds that they thought to use that approach - the answer is a familiarity with the language’s quirks, shortcuts, and delightful oddities.
In this talk, I’ll pair specific cryptic crossword clue types (anagrams, containers, homophones and more) with equivalent code‑golf strategies in Python (implicit truthiness, slicing tricks, walrus usage, whitespace hacks, clever comprehensions). You’ll learn how each puzzle tradition rewards pattern recognition, flexible thinking, and a deep understanding of rules - whether linguistic or syntactic. No cryptic crossword experience or code‑golf skill required.
Attendees will walk away able to decode several kinds of cryptic clues, recognise common code‑golf idioms in Python, and appreciate how playful constraints can sharpen your understanding of a language. Expect examples, audience-solving moments, and a lot of “Ohhh, that’s why that works!” reactions.
Who is the talk for? This will be a beginner friendly Python code golf and cryptic crossword talk starting with the basics and working up to crazy stuff. It should appeal to many, from those just trying to find out a new tip or those wanting to embark on a new hobby.
Amanda is a teacher at a co-educational secondary school in Sydney. She’s been trying to find really effective and engaging ways to teach students how to solve problems with code for some time now with mixed success. She is national head of content for the Girls Programming Network. She is part of the organising crew for the SydPy Sydney Python meetup and in that role tries hard to build community of diverse python enthusiasts. She always has some project on the go from e-textiles to making web tools to make her life easier. In a former life she was a database and web developer. In her opinion Python is the best mix of power and ease of use for beginner programmers. In her spare time she throws herself at bouldering walls or rides her bike.
