Tutorial: Basic Rebus Encoding

This and the following posts will cover the mechanics around some simple encoding you can use when constructing advanced crossword themes. I'll start by going over a basic rebus example, but the core concept can be expanded to more complex use cases. 

But first, a couple caveats:

1. For your basic rebus there is already functionality in Crossfire and some other programs. There's no support in my ancient version on Crossword Compiler, but I think their recent Pro upgrade has more robust options. 
   
   
2. I generally wouldn't recommend settling for auto-filling any rebus words when constructing. These are your star entries and should be hand-picked for peak quality.

As such, this shouldn't be exactly game-changing when building a rebus puzzle. But I think it's a good introduction to concepts I'll expand on in later posts. And since everything is based in wordlist manipulation, these strategies can be applied to whichever software you're most comfortable with.

The problem we're try to solve for is that we cannot enter more than one letter in one square. So if we enter our main theme answers with some placeholder for the rebus squares, then any autofill will use that placeholder letter rather then the entire string. The important thing to remember though is that the autofill is powered entirely by the wordlist you feed it. So all we need to do is create a new custom wordlist that plays by the software's rules.

To do this we need to encode our rebus string with a single character that wouldn't normally appear in your wordlist. For example, let's say we liked HIP TO BE SQUARE as a revealer for a HIP rebus puzzle. First, we would download our standard wordlist into Excel and filter down to all words containing "hip" (consider omitting low score entries, entries shorter than five letters, and entries with that string in them multiple times). 

Next we copy those results to a new tab, select all, and find/replace the string "hip" with, say, the number "3". The number you pick doesn't matter, you just need a single non-letter character that isn't used in your wordlist. 

Then we combine those encoded words with our original wordlist (consider deleting the original "hip" words so they don't inadvertently and inelegantly end up elsewhere in your puzzle). Finally, we upload this modified list as a new "Custom Hip List" in Crossword Compiler (note: in Crossfire you can just add the encoded words as a supplemental list).

Now we're good to go and can begin construction just like any other puzzle. We just switch our base word list from our normal one to the new custom list in Crossword Compiler (or select your new supplemental dictionary in Crossfire). Then enter your primary theme answers with a "3" in lieu of the "hip" string and you're on your way. 

Here's a grid I quickly threw together with just the revealer plus three strategically placed 3's. Obviously the short fill is rough (I autofilled the entire grid with no score min), but you can see how the encoding functions correctly and all the rebus entries look to be valid.

This example has the same rebus throughout, but it would work similarly for a puzzle with a few different rebuses. For instance, if we wanted to write a THREE SQUARE MEALS themed puzzle we would just encode each string with a different number:

1 = "BREAKFAST"

2 = "LUNCH"

3 = "DINNER"