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Nice! What dictionary did you use? Do you know if it's the same one that LetterPress uses? I've been thinking about coding a player for LetterPress. Longest word mixed in with some endgame logic would actually probably do fairly well against most players, but it'd be interesting to see what other strategies would come into play.
My idea was to create an iOS app that analyzed a screenshot taken of a letterpress screen. That way you could also optimize for not using dark-red letter colours. Maybe you should try that!
An example from Andy Baio: https://twitter.com/waxpancake/status/261990545570799616
I wrote a quick Python script last week that took the board position and returned the unplayed word with the highest point values (with a winning move being worth the max value). I thought about expanding it to look ahead, but it wasn't needed to beat human opponents.
The coup de grace would be to bundle it all up as an app that pulled from the camera roll and spat out a move.
I've already released an app with OCR, all HTML5 and runs in the browser : https://github.com/mauricesvay/CheaterPress
The other option would be to use some magic similar to Dropbox's Camera Upload to automatically save screenshots in the cloud, check whether they're Letterpress, and run server side analysis with a push notification. Feels like a gaping privacy hole there, so I didn't investigate.
My motivation is that a lot of the opponents I've been playing are coming up with the craziest words (and I'm a fairly literate person and regular Scrabble player). At that point, it just boils down to who has the best cheat program :-)
I am not sure if the app is using the right dictionary or if it is broken in Chrome. I used the string "AARGHQQQQQQQQQQQQQQQQQQQQ" to run a search and it returned no results. "aargh" is in the Letterpress dictionary. I wrote a quick Python script last week that took the board position and returned the unplayed word with the highest point values (with a winning move being worth the max value). I thought about expandin…
Looks like many of us had the same idea here. I've been trying to hack together iOS OCR libraries but realised it's actually quite doable without, so derailed a little and therefore got beaten to the post by you all :-) My thought being that the lowest level of friction always wins. The other option would be to use some magic similar to Dropbox's Camera Upload to automatically save screenshots in the cloud, check whe…
From there, with how simple the board UI is, it should be pretty easy to OCR it. Drop the color and you are 90% there.
There was a Where's Waldo post on HN about 2 days ago. Finding Waldo in that mess involved a bit more work and thought to chose what to look for. In this case it was the bands in the striped shirt that were most if the give-away.
I think you could do a nice app in iOS, though I personally hate the cheating apps. I wish games like Words With Friends, Scrabble, etc., would tell you if the player was in game or not, and possibly what app they switched to. Or provide a lockout mode where switching costs you the game.
Multi-tasking is a needed ability at times, and done games are long play, but certain cheater friends could be locked into a game they can't cheat in, which would be a nice feature.