High Quality Content by WIKIPEDIA articles! Packing problems are one area where mathematics meets puzzles (recreational mathematics). Many of these problems stem from real-life problems with packing items.Usually the packing must be without gaps or overlaps, but in some packing problems the overlapping (of goods with each other and/or with the boundary of the container) is allowed but should be minimised. In others, gaps are allowed, but overlaps are not (usually the total area of gaps has to be minimised).