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Andrew is cleaning his house but needs help. Your task is to get from bits to bobs to odds to ends. You can alter letters, one at a time, and each intermediate word must be a valid word in dictionary.com. You may not rearrange letters or make two words: ie. office->off ice. You may not use a program or online solver. Andrew has a guest coming to his house soon, so you need to do this as fast as possible (least number of steps).

P.S: Is this considered off-topic? I have the minimal solution in mind. Please let me know.

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2 Answers 2

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To improve on the previous answer,

bits bots bobs bods bids aids adds odds adds ands ends
bits bots bobs bubs buds ouds odds adds ands ends

Which places the minimal number of steps at 9.

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  • $\begingroup$ Nice job! Also, can you explain how you got to this answer? $\endgroup$
    – Dooper
    Mar 19, 2020 at 2:05
  • $\begingroup$ @Gareth McCaughan did the majority of the work; improving on bobs > odds was just a bit of trial and error on dictionary.com. I hope that's not what you meant by online solver. $\endgroup$
    – anodyne
    Mar 19, 2020 at 2:08
  • $\begingroup$ No, that's not what I meant. +1 :-) $\endgroup$
    – Dooper
    Mar 19, 2020 at 2:23
  • $\begingroup$ Ah, nice. Well done. $\endgroup$
    – Gareth McCaughan ♦
    Mar 19, 2020 at 10:37
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I can do it in

10 steps

as follows:

bits bots bobs bods bids aids adds odds adds ands ends

This feels about as good as should be possible, but maybe one can do better?

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  • $\begingroup$ Very close, but not minimal. $\endgroup$
    – Dooper
    Mar 19, 2020 at 1:36

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