another puzzle!

i recently came up with another puzzle... and i'm sure there are many puzzle lovers among you here... this one is a fairly simple one... so have a go at it!

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there's a fairly simple message in the cryptic puzzle below... try solve the puzzle to read the message :

8(1)4(2)4(3)7(4)
6(3)6(2)3(2)
4(3)7(4)
2(1)
3(3)2(1)4(3)7(3)5(3)9(3)
7(4)4(3)6(1)7(1)5(3)3(2)
7(1)8(2)9(4)9(4)5(3)3(2)

6(3)6(2)2(3)3(2)
9(3)6(3)8(2)
4(1)3(2)8(1)
6(3)6(2)3(2)
9(3)6(3)8(2)
4(2)2(1)8(3)3(2)
4(1)6(3)8(1)
8(1)4(2)3(2)6(1)
2(1)5(3)5(3)

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you can send in your answers through mail or leave it here as a comment... entries accepted till 16th jan. first person to crack it (based on the time stamp of your mail or comment) will be mentioned on the post after the 16th! go for it... fame and glory awaits you! :)

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p.s. for the answer check the comments... and for the record it was my school batch-mate sivaram manda who cracked it first! way to go buddy!

digital puzzle!

(solution provided at the bottom of this post)

this is a logical puzzle that struck me when i was waiting at one of those traffic signals which take inordinately long to turn green!

some of the signals mercifully have a digital counter which counts down the seconds between the signal color changes. and as i watched, i noticed that one of the digital digits was showing me a weird set of numerals as it was counting down. it was obviously because one of the 7 (3 horizontal and 4 vertical lines) lines of the figure 8 was not working.

this got me thinking up this particular problem -

which of the 7 lines of the figure 8, if it was not working, would still cause the counter to display the longest sequence of valid numerals, albeit not in logical order? (irrespective of whether the counter was counting up or down)

options -
1. top horizontal
2. middle horizontal
3. bottom horizontal
4. top-left vertical
5. bottom-left vertical
6. top-right vertical
7. bottom-right vertical

also list the sequence of valid numerals.

(p.s. you can send in your answers as comments or by email. the contest closes at 12 mid-night IST on 14th sept 2008)

p.s. in case you like such logical puzzles, click here to check out the previous one!

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quite a few people got the answer correctly... though some of them interpreted the problem a little differently...

the correct answer is option 5, the bottom-left vertical segment.

if this segment is defective then the longest sequence of valid numerals that result are - 3, 4, 5, 5 (instead of 6), 7, 9 (instead of 8) and 9!

i have posted all the comments received so far! manasi (http://forevermanasi.blogspot.com/) was the first respondent with the correct answer! :)

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