    WSPOOK -- 32-bit Windows (95, NT, 3.1x with Win32s) Cryptoquote Solver
                        2 July 1998 -- K. L. Dunn

    Ciphergram Solver for Windows v1.0
    Copyright (C) 1997  K. L. Dunn

    This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify
    it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by
    the Free Software Foundation; either version 2 of the License, or
    (at your option) any later version.

    This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful,
    but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of
    MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.  See the
    GNU General Public License for more details.

    You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License
    along with this program; if not, write to the Free Software
    Foundation, Inc., 59 Temple Place, Suite 330, Boston, MA  02111-1307  USA

    Author: K. L. Dunn    email: k.l.dunn@ieee.org

Ciphergram Solution Assistant -- A Cryptoquote Solver

A ciphergram (cryptoquote) is a (short) message that has been transformed
by a so-called "simple substitution cipher".  The fabled "Caesar shift" is
one of these, wherein the ciphertext is made from the plaintext by
substituting for each letter the one three places to the right in the
alphabet, modulo 26: A becomes D, X becomes B, L becomes P, and so on.

The Ciphergram Solution Assistant makes these assumptions about the cipher:

   No cipher letter may stand for itself in the plaintext.

   Each cipher letter stands for a unique plaintext letter, and each
     plaintext letter stands for a unique cipher letter (1:1 mapping).

   The spacing and punctuation of the plaintext is preserved.

   The plaintext is spelled correctly throughout.

WARNING! The results of the Ciphergram Solution Assistant are not
guaranteed or warranted in any way.  These results should NOT be
used as the basis of any commercial contract, obligation, or transaction.

The Ciphergram Solution Assistant will do the best it can to solve the
ciphergram.  It usually comes close to the "real" answer, with just a
few wrong letters.



Requirements for Installation:

386 or higher processor running Windows 95, NT, or 3.1x with Win32s.  If you
don't have Win32s, you can download it from:

http://www.microsoft.com/Win32devsupport/content/faq/win32s/win32sinstall/default.htm

About 2 MBytes of free disk space.

4 MB main memory (8 MB recommended).



Installation:

Make a directory that will hold the executable and the word list.  Example:
   C:\WSPOOK

CD to that directory.

Download the archive WSPOOKA.ZIP into the directory, and unpack it either by
running PKUNZIP on it, or by changing its name to WSPOOKA.EXE and executing
it in a DOS box.  Once the archive is unpacked, delete it (WSPOOKA.ZIP).

Make an icon for WSPOOK; have it point to the executable.  Example:
   C:\WSPOOK\WSPOOK.EXE

Make sure the directory you chose has the wordlist file NLIST in it.



Removal:

To remove (uninstall) WSPOOK, delete the icon you made, and delete the
files listed in the file rebuild.txt, including rebuild.txt, and finally
delete the directory these files were in.



Use:

Execute the program, either by running it (e.g. from the File Manager) or
by double-clicking the icon you made.

Enter the cryptoquote in the upper window division, and enter the attribute
in the second division.  The "attribute" is the "author"; in the newspapers,
it is what follows the dash near the end.  The third division is for giving
the CSA hints about the deciphering key; leave it blank at first.  See the
Web site's CSA help page for more information: http://home.hiwaay.net/~kdunn

You can cut/paste the entries from somewhere else (e.g. the notepad) if
you want to.

Click "Decipher" under the "Command" menu.  Shortly (after the program reads
the word list) the term "Working..." will appear in the bottom division.
Some time later, the solution (the best WSPOOK can do) will appear in the
bottom division.



Hints:

If you get garbage for an answer, or the program runs a very long time,
please check that:

   The cipher text is entered in the form correctly.

   The attribution (signature or author) is NOT included
     in the ciphergram, but IS entered in its proper box.

The Ciphergram Solution Assistant ignores punctuation by treating it as
white space, except for the apostrophe.  Consequently, if a word is split
by a hyphen (or any other character not a letter), it will be treated
as two words.  It may help to retype it as one word without the hyphen.

The Ciphergram Solution Assistant assumes that the ONLY one-letter words
are A and I.  If the attribution has initials, as in N. F. XYYHNYV,
including that in the ciphergram would make solution impossible, unless
the N and F just happen to represent A and I.

With the above in mind, it sometimes helps to include the attribution
(without initials, if any) in the ciphergram, as well as in the box,
but usually it does not.



Known Problems:

There is no on line help.

There is no provision for operation without a mouse.

The "hourglass" cursor does not display as it should.

If you kill the WSPOOK task before the solution appears, the main window
disappears, but the executable task may continue to completion -- this is
apparently harmless, but it uses a lot of CPU time.



Author:

  K. L. Dunn   k.l.dunn@ieee.org
