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Yes. Every time you get a problem with a rectangle table, you must paint it like a chessboard. If that is not enough to find the solution, you must try to think.

A small technical detail, dew to professional deformation. The article says that the numbers of squares of each color must be the same, but that only happens if the total number is even, like in this case 13+15=28. If the total number of squares is odd, then you get one extra square of one of the colors.

You must paint it, but it is sometimes better to choose a pattern specific to the problem you're trying to solve.

E.g. http://jeremykun.com/2011/06/26/tiling-a-chessboard/

Minor derail - I know I mistype 'their' as 'they're' and likewise for other similar homonym pairs all the time, but due -> dew is a particularly nice example of the genre :)

"making do" -> "making due" seems to be relatively common among US English speakers, too. In British pronunciation dew also sounds the same as due but both differ from the US "do"...

The problem and its proof are mentioned in EWD 1036: On the cruelty of really teaching computing science. < http://www.cs.utexas.edu/users/EWD/transcriptions/EWD10xx/EW... >

That is a really great paper! It should be required reading for all computer science types.

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