🧩 8-Puzzle Challenge: Human vs AI! 🤖

This project features an AI solver (Best-First Search with Manhattan distance) for the classic 8-Puzzle, complete with a Tkinter GUI that visualizes the AI's solution steps in real-time.

Overview

Experience the 8-Puzzle in a unique competitive setting! A volunteer can initiate the AI solver alongside a human's manual attempt on a physical puzzle. The graphical interface provides feedback on the AI's progress. A "Stop" button allows the volunteer to declare the human the winner if they successfully solve the puzzle before the AI algorithm completes its search.

This project demonstrates a basic AI search algorithm applied to a classic problem and offers an engaging way to compare human and machine problem-solving efficiency.

Features

• AI Solver: Implements the Best-First Search algorithm.
• Heuristic: Utilizes the Manhattan distance heuristic to guide the search.
• GUI Visualization: Uses Tkinter to visually represent the 8-Puzzle board and the AI's step-by-step solution.
• Customizable AI Speed: The volunteer can control the visualization speed using the time.sleep() function in the code.
• Human vs. AI Challenge: Designed for a real-world comparison where a human races against the AI.
• Volunteer Control: A "Start" button initiates the AI, and a "Stop" button allows declaring a human victory.

Code Description

• heapq: Used for implementing the priority queue in the Best-First Search.
• time: Used for introducing delays to visualize the AI's steps.
• tkinter: Used for creating the graphical user interface.
• GOAL_STATE: Defines the target configuration of the 8-Puzzle.
• manhattan_distance(state): Calculates the Manhattan distance heuristic for a given puzzle state.
• get_neighbors(state): Generates the possible next states from a given state by moving the blank tile (0).
• best_first_search(start_state): Implements the Best-First Search algorithm to find the solution path.
• read_start_state(): Defines the initial configuration of the puzzle for the challenge.
• update_gui_puzzle(state, labels): Updates the Tkinter GUI to display a given puzzle state.
• solve_puzzle(): Animates the solution path found by the AI on the GUI.
• start_puzzle(): Initiates the puzzle-solving animation.
• stop_puzzle(): Stops the animation and declares the human the winner.
• The main part of the script sets up the Tkinter window, creates the puzzle grid, and defines the start and stop buttons.

Author

Joe Mathew