How to solve “Einstein’s Riddle” in under 5 minutes (without cheating, just re-ordering the questions)

Who’s fucking fish is it anyway?

It’s dubious as to whether Einstein put together the Zebra Puzzle, but either way it’s widely attributed that way and unlikely to change, so we’ll run with it.

The version I was given is here, and what we’ll base our analysis upon: http://www.aptitude-test.com/einsteinsriddle.html

As a programmer this puzzle is actually quite a good abstraction of basically what I do for a crust – get given dozens of requirements in no logical order, and make sure they all fit the final code assembly. If only we were given such clear instructions that didn’t contradict each other…

Does that mean I was super amazing at it? Nope. I still took best part of an hour – probably because I used my geeky documenting of optimal logical pathways and refused to make any assumptions, relying 100% on the information provided. (this is why we have Business Analysts, to give us developers clear instructions to build new functionality/solve a defect)

Anyhoo if you read the questions in an order that eliminates possibilities on a low-hanging-fruit basis you’ll find it takes less than five minutes to conquer.

How to read the questions in order

There’s no spoilers or answers in here, this is just a hint guide for reading the questions in logical order.

9 – Norwegian, first house
14 – Norwegian, next to blue
8 – Middle drinks milk
4 – Green is left of White
5 – Green drinks coffee
1 – Brit is in red

This is enough to establish all the colours of the houses.

7 – Yellow smokes Dunhill
11 – Horses next to Dunhill

Now you’ll run out of instructive elements and need to make an elimination assessment (logical leap).

You can figure out what #1 drinks by looking at Q’s 3, 5, 8, and 12.

15 – Blends smoker lives next to water drinker
12 – Blue Master smoker drinks beer
3 – Dane drinks tea
13 – German smokes Prince
2 – Swede has dogs
6 – Pall Mall smoker has birds
10 – Blends smoker lives next to cats