From cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Thu Mar 25 14:32:49 1999 Return-Path: Received: from sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil (sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil [132.250.84.38]) by mc.lcs.mit.edu (8.9.1a/8.9.1-mod) with SMTP id OAA08105 for ; Thu, 25 Mar 1999 14:32:49 -0500 (EST) Precedence: bulk Errors-To: cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Date: Sun, 21 Mar 1999 11:59:19 -0500 (EST) From: der Mouse Message-Id: <199903211659.LAA04577@Twig.Rodents.Montreal.QC.CA> To: cube-lovers@ai.mit.edu Subject: Re: Taking apart the 5^3 >>>> I found it more effective to turn a "thick slice" (ie, the outer >>>> two slices turned together) about 45 degrees, then pry with my >>>> thumb between the corner and wing of the turned slice.... > That procedure is not recommended as it voids the implied warranty (a) doesn't this depend on the manufacturer? (b) doesn't taking it apart at all do that anyway? > and has the danger of permanently stripping the thread inside the > center of the cube. I can't see how. Based on how I saw my cube move as I did this, I don't believe it's putting significant stress on any of the face-center cubies. Remember, what I said to do was to push the wing cubie away from the corner cubie, not vice versa; the only face cubie anywhere near the operation is the one you're prying towards, and the wing cubie is pivoting around that, not prying past it. > If you must take the cube apart do so by prying off one of the center > small squares and then loosening one of the screws, After disassembling my cube, I remembered this advice, and tried to get one of the face centers off. Even with the cube disassembled, I desisted for fear of breaking the plastic rather than the glue join. Perhaps there are multiple production runs in existence and some of them come apart more easily this way than others? der Mouse mouse@rodents.montreal.qc.ca 7D C8 61 52 5D E7 2D 39 4E F1 31 3E E8 B3 27 4B From cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Thu Mar 25 14:42:29 1999 Return-Path: Received: from sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil (sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil [132.250.84.38]) by mc.lcs.mit.edu (8.9.1a/8.9.1-mod) with SMTP id OAA08119 for ; Thu, 25 Mar 1999 14:42:29 -0500 (EST) Precedence: bulk Errors-To: cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu From: "Dallas Foster" Reply-To: "Dallas Foster" To: Subject: Instructions needed Date: Thu, 25 Mar 1999 13:01:23 -0500 Message-Id: <01be76e9$7e7e0c40$03c3d4d1@dallasfo> I have a Rubik's Magic Strategy Game that consists of the playing board, 16 playpieces and instructions. Unfortunately we have lost the instructions and our son, who's game it is no longer lives at home and can't remember how it was played. Would you have or know where I might obtain a copy of these instructions. The game is of no use to us with out them. The game was distributed by Matchbox toys in 1987. Any help you can lend would be greatly appreciated. Thank You, Mrs. D.D. Foster 2734 W. Maple Street Anderson, IN 46013 USA fostindi@ecicnet.com From cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Thu Mar 25 19:29:58 1999 Return-Path: Received: from sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil (sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil [132.250.84.38]) by mc.lcs.mit.edu (8.9.1a/8.9.1-mod) with SMTP id TAA08877 for ; Thu, 25 Mar 1999 19:29:58 -0500 (EST) Precedence: bulk Errors-To: cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Date: Thu, 25 Mar 1999 21:59:53 +0000 From: David Singmaster To: jbryan@pstcc.cc.tn.us Cc: cube-lovers@ai.mit.edu Message-Id: <009D5A93.46B93D17.11@ice.sbu.ac.uk> Subject: RE: Re : RE: parity pairs If one really wants trouble with cube colors being indistinguishable try solving under a sodium vapor street lamp. I found this gave two colors: grey and greyer! DAVID SINGMASTER, Professor of Mathematics and Metagrobologist School of Computing, Information Systems and Mathematics Southbank University, London, SE1 0AA, UK. Tel: 0171-815 7411; fax: 0171-815 7499; email: zingmast or David.Singmaster @sbu.ac.uk From cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Fri Mar 26 15:39:42 1999 Return-Path: Received: from sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil (sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil [132.250.84.38]) by mc.lcs.mit.edu (8.9.1a/8.9.1-mod) with SMTP id PAA12037 for ; Fri, 26 Mar 1999 15:39:42 -0500 (EST) Precedence: bulk Errors-To: cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Date: Thu, 25 Mar 1999 23:58:38 -0500 (Eastern Standard Time) From: Dale Newfield Reply-To: DNewfield@cs.virginia.edu To: cube-lovers@ai.mit.edu Subject: RE: Re : RE: parity pairs In-Reply-To: <009D5A93.46B93D17.11@ice.sbu.ac.uk> Message-Id: On Thu, 25 Mar 1999, David Singmaster wrote: > If one really wants trouble with cube colors being indistinguishable > try solving under a sodium vapor street lamp. I found this gave two colors: > grey and greyer! Or corner Andrew Plotkin and get him to let you try out "The Liquid Crystal Cube" (http://www.eblong.com/~zarf/custom-cubes.html) -- Apparently quite a challenge. -Dale [Moderator's note: I was going to say "Mood cube", but of course zarf has already heard that one. Tastefully, he resists the nomenclature. --Dan ] From cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Fri Mar 26 18:20:51 1999 Return-Path: Received: from sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil (sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil [132.250.84.38]) by mc.lcs.mit.edu (8.9.1a/8.9.1-mod) with SMTP id SAA12501 for ; Fri, 26 Mar 1999 18:20:51 -0500 (EST) Precedence: bulk Errors-To: cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Message-Id: <19990326231259.15935.qmail@hotmail.com> From: "Don Harper" To: Cube-Lovers@ai.mit.edu Subject: Subject: RE: Re : RE: parity pairs Date: Fri, 26 Mar 1999 15:12:58 PST I always had problems solving the cube in bars. I would always have a "friend" that would want to drag me into a bar and make money off of my cube solving skills, but the lighting was always low and I couldn't tell the colors apart. Along those lines, I have a brass cube. Easy to solve, or nearly impossible? It is heavy, even though I believe it is only "plated". I have a picture of it on my web site at: http://www.geocities.com/Colosseum/Sideline/2953/ I also have a "cubo 15" cube you all may find interesting. Thanks! Don Harper From cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Fri Mar 26 18:37:05 1999 Return-Path: Received: from sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil (sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil [132.250.84.38]) by mc.lcs.mit.edu (8.9.1a/8.9.1-mod) with SMTP id SAA12529 for ; Fri, 26 Mar 1999 18:37:05 -0500 (EST) Precedence: bulk Errors-To: cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Date: Fri, 26 Mar 1999 03:46:13 -0500 (EST) From: Nicholas Bodley To: David Singmaster Cc: jbryan@pstcc.cc.tn.us, cube-lovers@ai.mit.edu Subject: Colors under Na vapor lamps (Was: RE: Re : RE: parity pairs) In-Reply-To: <009D5A93.46B93D17.11@ice.sbu.ac.uk> Message-Id: On Thu, 25 Mar 1999, David Singmaster wrote: } If one really wants trouble with cube colors being indistinguishable }try solving under a sodium vapor street lamp. I found this gave two colors: }grey and greyer! Here in the northeastern US, high-pressure sodium (Na) vapor lamps are common; they have a much broader spectrum that the essentially monochromatic low-pressure lamps. The latter are rather strange! They're also more efficient, I'm fairly sure. I haven't looked at a cube under the h.p. lamps, though. |* Nicholas Bodley *|* Autodidact & Polymath * Electronic Tech. (ret.) |* Waltham, Mass. *|* ----------------------------------------------- |* nbodley@tiac.net *|* |* Amateur musician *|* From cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Mon Mar 29 12:46:44 1999 Return-Path: Received: from sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil (sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil [132.250.84.38]) by mc.lcs.mit.edu (8.9.1a/8.9.1-mod) with SMTP id MAA20106 for ; Mon, 29 Mar 1999 12:46:44 -0500 (EST) Precedence: bulk Errors-To: cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu To: cube-lovers@ai.mit.edu From: whuang@ugcs.caltech.edu (Wei-Hwa Huang) Subject: Re: Instructions needed Date: 26 Mar 1999 23:51:28 GMT Organization: California Institute of Technology, Pasadena Message-Id: <7dh6i0$ekh@gap.cco.caltech.edu> References: "Dallas Foster" writes: >I have a Rubik's Magic Strategy Game that consists of the playing board, >16 playpieces and instructions. Unfortunately we have lost the >instructions and our son, who's game it is no longer lives at home and >can't remember how it was played. >Would you have or know where I might obtain a copy of these >instructions. The game is of no use to us with out them. The game was >distributed by Matchbox toys in 1987. The simplest thing you can do is to go to your local store and buy a copy of "Rubik's Eclipse". The rules are identical. I may have a copy of the original game lying around if this is unsucessful. -- Wei-Hwa Huang, whuang@ugcs.caltech.edu, http://www.ugcs.caltech.edu/~whuang/ --------------------------------------------------------------------------- This new video game can challenge feet (8,7) From cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Mon Mar 29 13:47:07 1999 Return-Path: Received: from sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil (sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil [132.250.84.38]) by mc.lcs.mit.edu (8.9.1a/8.9.1-mod) with SMTP id NAA20317 for ; Mon, 29 Mar 1999 13:47:06 -0500 (EST) Precedence: bulk Errors-To: cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu From: WaVeReBeL@webtv.net Date: Fri, 26 Mar 1999 23:57:49 -0800 (PST) To: Cube-Lovers@ai.mit.edu Subject: Wrist pains Message-Id: <10861-36FC8F7D-5994@mailtod-121.bryant.webtv.net> Hi all, I've been having some marathon cubing sessions lately, and sometimes my wrists, fingers, or forearms would hurt. It's really hard to stop because I'm so addicted, but I have to because I'm scared I might get carpal tunnel syndrome or some sort of repetitive stress problem. I love computers, and since I'm studying computer science, and because I'll have many many hours on a keyboard ahead of me, this scares me even more. Does anyone else have have this problem? Any advice? Thanks. -Alex Montilla- [ Moderator's note: Dame Kathleen Ollerenshaw is mentioned in Singmaster's notes as being one of the first to develop cubist's thumb; Roger Frye also got a wrist sprain as he mentioned on this list in 1981. Repetitive stress injury is nothing to play with, and continuing only makes recovery take longer, so stop now! Switch to a simulator. Simulators I've seen are somewhat less convenient to use than a real cube (though I haven't seen the recent ones), but if that's the case I hope this motivates you to change that sorry state. -- Dan ] From cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Mon Mar 29 14:18:29 1999 Return-Path: Received: from sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil (sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil [132.250.84.38]) by mc.lcs.mit.edu (8.9.1a/8.9.1-mod) with SMTP id OAA20419 for ; Mon, 29 Mar 1999 14:18:29 -0500 (EST) Precedence: bulk Errors-To: cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Message-Id: <36FEEE8F.CE5E8EBE@binghamton.edu> Date: Sun, 28 Mar 1999 22:07:59 -0500 From: Mirek Goljan Organization: SUNY Binghamton To: sausage@zeta.org.au Cc: cube-lovers@ai.mit.edu Subject: Speed cubing Hello, Wayne and other speed cubists, if you see about 15 year backwards you would realize that a few speed cubists have their average time below 20 sec and quite a lot of others below 25 sec. But you are interested in CURRENT Best Time and Average Time, I see. After a few weeks of practicing my times are: 18 sec, 24 sec, (not bad after some years of 'abstinence' :-)) My method is Jiri's. Beside that, I practice in solving the cube in minimum moves (face moves) for which I use slightly different method for first two layers: 2x2 subcube first, 2x2x3 next, 2x3x3 - two layers and for the last layer I may or may not use some more moves than Jiri's method uses. My average number of moves is about 48 within 2 min restriction. Mirek ******************************** Miroslav Goljan Watson School of Engineering and Applied Science, Dept. of EE State University of New York PO BOX 00238 Binghamton, NY 13902-6000 e-mail: bg22976@binghamton.edu ******************************** From cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Mon Mar 29 15:19:18 1999 Return-Path: Received: from sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil (sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil [132.250.84.38]) by mc.lcs.mit.edu (8.9.1a/8.9.1-mod) with SMTP id PAA20818 for ; Mon, 29 Mar 1999 15:19:18 -0500 (EST) Precedence: bulk Errors-To: cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu To: cube-lovers@ai.mit.edu From: whuang@ugcs.caltech.edu (Wei-Hwa Huang) Subject: Re: Taking apart the 5^3 Date: 26 Mar 1999 23:43:35 GMT Organization: California Institute of Technology, Pasadena Message-Id: <7dh637$ea1@gap.cco.caltech.edu> References: der Mouse writes: >Perhaps there are multiple production runs in existence and some of >them come apart more easily this way than others? This is definitely true. Mine fell off after a few days -- I eventually glued them back on. -- Wei-Hwa Huang, whuang@ugcs.caltech.edu, http://www.ugcs.caltech.edu/~whuang/ --------------------------------------------------------------------------- This new video game can challenge feet (8,7) From cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Mon Mar 29 18:40:48 1999 Return-Path: Received: from sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil (sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil [132.250.84.38]) by mc.lcs.mit.edu (8.9.1a/8.9.1-mod) with SMTP id SAA21466 for ; Mon, 29 Mar 1999 18:40:47 -0500 (EST) Precedence: bulk Errors-To: cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu From: wheeler@cipr.rpi.edu (Frederick W. Wheeler) Message-Id: <14080.1711.289304.134028@cipr.no_spam.rpi.edu> Date: Mon, 29 Mar 1999 18:03:11 -0500 (EST) To: Cube-Lovers@ai.mit.edu Subject: Inventing your own techniques I've been reading Cube-Lovers e-mail for a few months now and am enjoying it very much. It is one of the great benefits of the Internet that people with a common interest, but spread so far apart, can so easily communicate like this. For me, the most fun, and the ultimate challenge, in cubing comes from figuring out how to solve the puzzle in the first place. I avoid published and posted techniques. I'd really like to hear from people on this list on how you go about inventing new moves and techniques or how you feel about learning to solve a puzzle on your own. I vaguely remember how I learned to solve the 3x3x3 back in the early 80's. I was in 8th grade at the time; now I'm in 25th grade. According to my family I quite thoroughly infatuated by the puzzle at the time. Solving one side was faily easy and then I was able to get 2 and 3 sides, but with a disorganized and perhaps even random method. I heard from a friend (who had a solution book) that the key to solving the top and bottom was a set of special moves that allowed you to manipulate the bottom corner pieces without affecting the top side. I set out to find these moves on my own and did. I would carefully record the position and orientation of each corner piece, then move a top corner out of position and then back into position in a different way and check how the bottom side changed. This led to a few sequences which I could repeatedly apply to solve the bottom corners. The rest was fairly easy, except for the situation in which two edges were flipped. I had to have someone show me a move to get past this point. I couldn't figure it out. Otherwise, I had a 50% chance of solving on any given attempt. Now I have a 4x4x4 and a 5x5x5 cube as well. I've been able to solve these primarily using extensions of the techniques I learned for the 3x3x3 and a few new extras, but only to a point. I'm now stuck if one pair of "wing" pieces are switched. If two pairs are switched, I can solve it, but not if only one are switched. Again, I solve it 50% of the times I set out. Of course, there was at least on posted solution for this very problem to this list a couple of weeks ago. I saved it to a folder just in case I decide to resort to it, but in the mean time want to figure this out on my own. Regards, Fred Wheeler -- Fred Wheeler wheeler@cipr.rpi.edu www.cipr.rpi.edu/wheeler From cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Tue Mar 30 14:02:52 1999 Return-Path: Received: from sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil (sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil [132.250.84.38]) by mc.lcs.mit.edu (8.9.1a/8.9.1-mod) with SMTP id OAA24505 for ; Tue, 30 Mar 1999 14:02:51 -0500 (EST) Precedence: bulk Errors-To: cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Reply-To: From: "Noel Dillabough" To: "Cube Lovers (E-mail)" Cc: Subject: RE: Wrist pains Date: Mon, 29 Mar 1999 23:42:38 -0500 Message-Id: <000001be7a68$23427d20$040a0a0a@laptop> In-Reply-To: <10861-36FC8F7D-5994@mailtod-121.bryant.webtv.net> [ Moderator's note: Dame Kathleen Ollerenshaw is mentioned in Singmaster's notes as being one of the first to develop cubist's thumb; Roger Frye also got a wrist sprain as he mentioned on this list in 1981. Repetitive stress injury is nothing to play with, and continuing only makes recovery take longer, so stop now! Switch to a simulator. Simulators I've seen are somewhat less convenient to use than a real cube (though I haven't seen the recent ones), but if that's the case I hope this motivates you to change that sorry state. -- Dan ] As a programmer, I am no stranger to repetitive stress related aches and pains. I even had cubist's thumb way back :) My simulator, puzzler, has mainly a mouse interface and this given enough time can cause you to be rather sore as well. I was wondering if anyone had an idea for a "hands on keyboard" approach that would allow you to naturally move the puzzles' slices. There is a macro interface for the cubes to enter moves in UDFBLR notation, but I am thinking of something that you could, with practice, manipulate a cube in realtime using a keyboard. Any ideas would be appreciated and I'll try my best to implement the best one. If simulators "felt" like a cube when you used them they would be more fun (and move without jamming etc) -Noel From cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Tue Mar 30 15:11:03 1999 Return-Path: Received: from sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil (sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil [132.250.84.38]) by mc.lcs.mit.edu (8.9.1a/8.9.1-mod) with SMTP id PAA24788 for ; Tue, 30 Mar 1999 15:11:03 -0500 (EST) Precedence: bulk Errors-To: cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Date: Tue, 30 Mar 1999 12:53:02 +0100 From: David Singmaster To: WaVeReBeL@webtv.net Cc: cube-lovers@ai.mit.edu Message-Id: <009D5E34.B59FB7EA.32@ice.sbu.ac.uk> Subject: RE: Wrist pains Beryl Fletcher, who organized my first cube at the International Congress of Mathematicians in Helsinki in 1978, also developed Cubist's Thumb. The early cubes were stiff and one held them with a corner pressing on the tendon of the left thumbb, in the fleshy part of the thumb. With olde people, the tendon sheath, or rather the inner lubricant, has become a bit aged and the constant pressure leads to a chronic inflammation. This is readily treated by a small operation which cuts open the tendon sheath. Both Dame Kathleen Ollerneshaw and Beryl Fletcher had this. When I was working on my Notes, I did a lot of checking of move sequences and typing and got definite pains in the wrist. Since then, word processing has also occasionally produced RSI problems. Fortunately, rest lets it go away, but I have had physiotherapy several times. There were several periods when I had to stop typing for several weeks! The most unusual diagnosis was stiff neck due to tension while typing. Physiotherapy helped that. All the warnings/instructions about RSI are worth heeding. Take breaks. Stretch regularly. Make sure your work station is comfortable. Etc. RSI is real and I've known several people semi-permanently disabled by it. DAVID SINGMASTER, Professor of Mathematics and Metagrobologist School of Computing, Information Systems and Mathematics Southbank University, London, SE1 0AA, UK. Tel: 0171-815 7411; fax: 0171-815 7499; email: zingmast or David.Singmaster @sbu.ac.uk From cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Tue Mar 30 16:55:26 1999 Return-Path: Received: from sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil (sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil [132.250.84.38]) by mc.lcs.mit.edu (8.9.1a/8.9.1-mod) with SMTP id QAA25175 for ; Tue, 30 Mar 1999 16:55:25 -0500 (EST) Precedence: bulk Errors-To: cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu To: cube-lovers@ai.mit.edu From: whuang@ugcs.caltech.edu (Wei-Hwa Huang) Subject: Re: Inventing your own techniques Date: 30 Mar 1999 14:55:07 GMT Organization: California Institute of Technology, Pasadena Message-Id: <7dqokb$43e@gap.cco.caltech.edu> References: wheeler@cipr.rpi.edu (Frederick W. Wheeler) writes: >For me, the most fun, and the ultimate challenge, in cubing comes from >figuring out how to solve the puzzle in the first place. I avoid >published and posted techniques. I'd really like to hear from people >on this list on how you go about inventing new moves and techniques or >how you feel about learning to solve a puzzle on your own. After I understood conjugation well enough, I have never invented a move that I can in all honesty call "new" -- although they may appear "new" to others. The only new part is just applying it to different types of moves and seeing what the result is. -- Wei-Hwa Huang, whuang@ugcs.caltech.edu, http://www.ugcs.caltech.edu/~whuang/ --------------------------------------------------------------------------- She ran by screaming "No, I run by moving my feet rapidly, you idiot!" From cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Tue Mar 30 18:05:07 1999 Return-Path: Received: from sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil (sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil [132.250.84.38]) by mc.lcs.mit.edu (8.9.1a/8.9.1-mod) with SMTP id SAA25385 for ; Tue, 30 Mar 1999 18:05:07 -0500 (EST) Precedence: bulk Errors-To: cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Date: Tue, 30 Mar 1999 16:25:51 -0500 (EST) From: Nicholas Bodley To: Noel Dillabough Cc: "Cube Lovers (E-mail)" , WaVeReBeL@webtv.net Subject: RE: Wrist pains In-Reply-To: <000001be7a68$23427d20$040a0a0a@laptop> Message-Id: On Mon, 29 Mar 1999, Noel Dillabough wrote: }Any ideas would be appreciated and I'll try my best to implement the best }one. If simulators "felt" like a cube when you used them they would be more }fun (and move without jamming etc) Can you imagine force-feedback joystick technology? Hooray for the reset button! I very recently tried a demo at a computer store; pleasant surprise. |* Nicholas Bodley *|* Autodidact & Polymath * Electronic Tech. (ret.) |* Waltham, Mass. *|* |* nbodley@tiac.net *|* |* Amateur musician *|* -------------------------------------------------------------------------- From cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Tue Mar 30 19:30:45 1999 Return-Path: Received: from sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil (sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil [132.250.84.38]) by mc.lcs.mit.edu (8.9.1a/8.9.1-mod) with SMTP id TAA25856 for ; Tue, 30 Mar 1999 19:30:45 -0500 (EST) Precedence: bulk Errors-To: cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Message-Id: <370168C9.9ECB5992@whitewolf.com.au> Date: Wed, 31 Mar 1999 10:14:01 +1000 From: Ryan Heise To: noel@mud.ca Cc: "Cube Lovers (E-mail)" , WaVeReBeL@webtv.net Subject: Keyboard cube [was: Re: Wrist pains] References: <000001be7a68$23427d20$040a0a0a@laptop> Noel Dillabough wrote: > As a programmer, I am no stranger to repetitive stress related aches and > pains. I even had cubist's thumb way back :) My simulator, puzzler, has > mainly a mouse interface and this given enough time can cause you to be > rather sore as well. I was wondering if anyone had an idea for a "hands on > keyboard" approach that would allow you to naturally move the puzzles' > slices. I had some ideas on this once. The first keyboard layout below is easier to learn but the second would be faster once you had mastered it. [QWERTY keyboard] 1) U = r U'= u D'= f D = j R = 7 R'= m L'= 4 L = v F = h F'= g B'= y B = t 2) Any mappings using this set of keys: er ui asdf jkl; The simulator input key should be configurable so you can try out these variations once its written. If you want help implementing it, feel free to ask me - just in case I ever have some free time on my hands! -- Ryan Heise http://www.progsoc.uts.edu.au/~rheise/ From cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Tue Mar 30 20:15:57 1999 Return-Path: Received: from sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil (sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil [132.250.84.38]) by mc.lcs.mit.edu (8.9.1a/8.9.1-mod) with SMTP id UAA25946 for ; Tue, 30 Mar 1999 20:15:56 -0500 (EST) Precedence: bulk Errors-To: cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Message-Id: <199903302344.SAA11205@life.ai.mit.edu> From: Norman Richards To: "Cube Lovers (E-mail)" Subject: Keyboard cube [was: Re: Wrist pains] In-Reply-To: <000001be7a68$23427d20$040a0a0a@laptop> Date: Tue, 30 Mar 1999 17:47:33 -0600 > [...] I was wondering if anyone had an idea for a "hands on > keyboard" approach that would allow you to naturally move the puzzles' > slices. > > There is a macro interface for the cubes to enter moves in UDFBLR notation, > but I am thinking of something that you could, with practice, manipulate a > cube in realtime using a keyboard. Oddly enough, I have been thinking about a method to manipulate a cube by use of the numeric keypad. It seems most moves can be completed rather naturally, but I do not know if it works in practice. Anyways, take a keypad like this: 7 8 9 4 5 6 1 2 3 This corresponds to a face of a cube quite nicely. Suppose you wanted to rotate the right face clockwise. One could enter 36 or 69, for example, which you could conceptually think of as the direction your hand would move to rotate the right face clockwise. Counter clockwise would be the other direction. (96 or 63 or even 93) The same technique could be applied to the left face or top face or bottom face. The middle slices could be rotated just as easil: 52 would rotate the middle vertical slice down. The question is how to effect rotating the front and rear faces. For me, 19 and 91 seem natural for F and F' because they basically mimic the twisting motion. The rear is more troublesome, but perhaps for symetry 73 and 37 might be used? Anyways, that could take care the turns, Cube rotations could be as simple as a shift followed by a direction. shift-5-2 might rotate the cube along the X axis such that U is now F and F is now D, etc... I do not know if keypad entry is any more or less prone to these types of entry, but I think that the general mechanism might work. ___________________________________________________________________________ orb@cs.utexas.edu soli deo gloria From cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Wed Mar 31 12:38:08 1999 Return-Path: Received: from sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil (sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil [132.250.84.38]) by mc.lcs.mit.edu (8.9.1a/8.9.1-mod) with SMTP id MAA28949 for ; Wed, 31 Mar 1999 12:38:07 -0500 (EST) Precedence: bulk Errors-To: cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Message-Id: <4.1.19990330184411.00932b80@mail.vt.edu> Date: Tue, 30 Mar 1999 18:52:17 -0500 To: Cube-Lovers@ai.mit.edu From: Kevin Young Subject: Future Rubiks Products Your Vote Counts! In-Reply-To: References: <000001be7a68$23427d20$040a0a0a@laptop> Hello- We talked in the past about Oddzon (Current distributor of Rubik's Products for Seven Towns - the holder of the Rubik's brand) and the version of the Rubik's Cube on the market. If you are tired of those stickers that fall apart and would like a well built cube...one that has a sprung indexing mechanism which would mean that a layer would gently "click" into place when aligned along with tiles instead of stickers, then it's time for you to place your vote and influence them. They are currently looking into making a "Deluxe" Rubik's Cube, but, need to see if the market will support such a product. Anyway, you can place your vote at the following link: http://www.rubiks.com/poll.html?q=6 Be sure to browse their web site while you are there. Check out their news link to find out more on the production of the "Deluxe" Rubik's Cube. Click on the following link to go directly to their web site: http://www.rubiks.com Happy Cubing! Kevin Young From cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Wed Mar 31 13:17:28 1999 Return-Path: Received: from sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil (sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil [132.250.84.38]) by mc.lcs.mit.edu (8.9.1a/8.9.1-mod) with SMTP id NAA29097 for ; Wed, 31 Mar 1999 13:17:28 -0500 (EST) Precedence: bulk Errors-To: cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Date: Wed, 31 Mar 1999 08:46:33 -0500 (Eastern Standard Time) From: Jerry Bryan Subject: Re : Keyboard cube [was: Re: Wrist pains] In-Reply-To: <199903302344.SAA11205@life.ai.mit.edu> To: Cube Lovers Message-Id: On Tue, 30 Mar 1999 17:47:33 -0600 Norman Richards wrote: > > > [...] I was wondering if anyone had an idea for a "hands on > > keyboard" approach that would allow you to naturally move the puzzles' > > slices. > > I fought with this issue back in about 1985 when I was originally working on the 2x2x2 and the corners of the 3x3x3. I created a data base for each, with a program which would allow you to manipulate the cube on the screen, and the program would always show you your exact distance from Start. Actually, the screen would show you two renderings of the cube -- one was the cube you were manipulating and the other was the representative of the same cube under reduction by symmetry. It was the representative that was looked up in the data base. I tried all kinds of input mappings, none of which were very satisfying. One obvious thing to try is U for Up, D for Down, etc., but on a QWERTY keyboard this is not very easy to deal with. Keyboards in 1985 only had a numeric pad, not the additional arrow and page up/down keys of modern keyboards. Within the numeric pad, I ended up using up arrow for U, down arrow for D, right arrow for R, and left arrow for L. That left the question of F and B. It *sounds* kind of dumb, but using the numeric pad + key for B and the numeric pad 0/INS key for F worked about as well as anything. With these mappings, I could manipulate the cube without looking at the keyboard and with very little movement of my hand. I used the shift keys for things like U' and U2. So left shift plus up arrow was U' and right shift plus up arrow was U2, etc. I read the shift keys directly from the keyboard hardware (this was early DOS, and you could do such things). I wouldn't necessarily recommend accessing the hardware so directly these days. However, I found that I almost never used the shift keys. Rather, I would tap the up arrow key quickly three times for U', and I would tap the up arrow key quickly two times for U2. I did not implement an interface for whole cube moves. Rather, to rotate the whole cube I would do something like RL' or R'L or UD' etc. Well, this works for the 2x2x2, but not for the corners of the 3x3x3. It's tricky to make the interface simple and intuitive, and also to make it functionally rich at the same time. ---------------------------------------- Jerry Bryan jbryan@pstcc.cc.tn.us Pellissippi State Technical Community College From cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Wed Mar 31 14:47:54 1999 Return-Path: Received: from sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil (sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil [132.250.84.38]) by mc.lcs.mit.edu (8.9.1a/8.9.1-mod) with SMTP id OAA29488 for ; Wed, 31 Mar 1999 14:47:54 -0500 (EST) Precedence: bulk Errors-To: cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Message-Id: <4.1.19990331093309.0265e700@pop.ncsa.uiuc.edu> Date: Wed, 31 Mar 1999 09:48:07 -0600 To: cube-lovers@ai.mit.edu From: Tom Magliery Subject: Re: Keyboard cube [was: Re: Wrist pains] In-Reply-To: <199903302344.SAA11205@life.ai.mit.edu> References: <000001be7a68$23427d20$040a0a0a@laptop> i already sent this to noel directly, but since others are sending suggestions here i thought i'd toss in my thoughts about a keyboard cube interface... mag At 11:42 PM 3/29/99 -0500, Noel Dillabough unabashedly said: >There is a macro interface for the cubes to enter moves in UDFBLR notation, >but I am thinking of something that you could, with practice, manipulate a >cube in realtime using a keyboard. this is a wonderful user interface design challenge. i've thought about it before, because i have never been comfortable with any of the mouse-based interfaces for moving 3d objects around. i've never used one that seemed fully intuitive to me. i'd love to see an interface like this: * 5 faces of the cube visible at once (all except B), perhaps something like this (except square, and with the individual cubies showing of course): +------------------+ |\ /| | \ U / | | \ / | | +----------+ | | | | | | L | F | R | | | | | | | | | | +----------+ | | / \ | | / D \ | |/ \| +------------------+ * unshifted keys for turning each of the visible faces either CW or CCW, a total of 10 keys in all, and repeated on the left- and right-hand side of the keyboard. the following diagram shows the cube operations thus associated with various keys (though the diagram is laid out mostly like the keyboard, i've added space between the hands for clarity): w:L' e:U' r:U t:R y:L' u:U' i:U o:R s:F' f:F j:F' l:F x:L c:D' v:D b:R' n:L m:D' ,:D .:R' * shifted keys for turning the cube itself. again, available on both hands. 3 axes of rotation, two directions each ==> only 6 keys needed on each hand. but why not have even more duplication? for example, suppose (in real life) you want to roll the cube forward away from you. you might do it by either grabbing it from the R side or the L side. hence the same 10 keys as above, when shifted, work to turn the entire cube in the same direction as they turn the faces when unshifted. -- ///X Tom Magliery, Research Programmer 217-333-3198 .---o \\\ NCSA, 605 E. Springfield O- mag@ncsa.uiuc.edu `-O-. /// Champaign, IL 61820 http://sdg.ncsa.uiuc.edu/~mag/ o---' From cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Wed Mar 31 21:24:53 1999 Return-Path: Received: from sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil (sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil [132.250.84.38]) by mc.lcs.mit.edu (8.9.1a/8.9.1-mod) with SMTP id VAA00984 for ; Wed, 31 Mar 1999 21:24:53 -0500 (EST) Message-Id: <199904010224.VAA00984@mc.lcs.mit.edu> Precedence: bulk Errors-To: cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Date: Tue, 30 Mar 1999 21:57:43 -0500 (EST) From: Nichael Cramer To: Norman Richards Cc: "Cube Lovers (E-mail)" Subject: Re: Keyboard cube [was: Re: Wrist pains] In-Reply-To: <199903302344.SAA11205@life.ai.mit.edu> Norman Richards wrote: > Oddly enough, I have been thinking about a method to manipulate a > cube by use of the numeric keypad. It seems most moves can be > completed rather naturally, but I do not know if it works in practice. > > Anyways, take a keypad like this: > > 7 8 9 > 4 5 6 > 1 2 3 > > This corresponds to a face of a cube quite nicely. Suppose you > wanted to rotate the right face clockwise. One could enter 36 or 69, > for example, which you could conceptually think of as the direction > your hand would move to rotate the right face clockwise. Counter > clockwise would be the other direction. (96 or 63 or even 93) The > same technique could be applied to the left face or top face or bottom > face. The middle slices could be rotated just as easil: 52 would rotate > the middle vertical slice down. Or a extension of your scheme might be to combine arrow keys with the keypad, in a two-handed approach. I.e. 6^ or 6v rather than 36 or 69; no order dependence this way. (Likewise, I find the arrow keys more mnemomic.) The model is that you're "grabbing" the specified cubie and rotating it in the specified direction. In its most natural form, this assumes that the numeric key-pad and the arrow keys are separate (as they are on my keyboard), although one could certainly use some other set of "directional" keys aside from the standard arrow keys. And as I say, this also assumes --most naturally, although not necessarily-- a two-handed approach. > The question is how to effect rotating the front and rear faces. > For me, 19 and 91 seem natural for F and F' because they basically > mimic the twisting motion. The rear is more troublesome, but perhaps > for symetry 73 and 37 might be used? For completeness, too, there is also the slice between the front and back face. Rather than muddy the paradigm, perhaps other (non-assigned) keys should be used. The handy "0" key might make a natural candidate for the front face. On the other hand since the back face and middle slice are rather "pathological" cases in this paradigm, might it perhaps make sense to use keys "outside" the model? For example "R" and "M". (Or, less mnemonically --and depending on the set-up of your keyboard-- "/" or "*" or ".", which on my keyboard are right beside the numeric keypad keys.) (For these last cases, perhaps on the <- and -> keys should by operational. The up and down arrows being less meaningful here.) > Anyways, that could take care the turns, Cube rotations could be as > simple as a shift followed by a direction. [...] This seems like a good scheme. N From cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Thu Apr 1 14:42:07 1999 Return-Path: Received: from sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil (sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil [132.250.84.38]) by mc.lcs.mit.edu (8.9.1a/8.9.1-mod) with SMTP id OAA03933 for ; Thu, 1 Apr 1999 14:42:07 -0500 (EST) Precedence: bulk Errors-To: cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Date: Thu, 1 Apr 1999 14:07:30 -0500 (EST) From: Nicholas Bodley To: Nichael Cramer Cc: Norman Richards , "Cube Lovers (E-mail)" Subject: Spaceball (tm) input to a Cube simulator In-Reply-To: <199904010224.VAA00984@mc.lcs.mit.edu> Message-Id: If anyone has a Spaceball, it should make quite a nice input device. It senses both torque about all 3 orthog. axes, and linear displacement forces ditto; a total of 6 channels. Displacement could select a layer, which could be highlighted (anyone for alpha-channel translucency?), and torque would rotate the selected layer. |* Nicholas Bodley *|* |* Waltham, Mass. *|* |* nbodley@tiac.net *|* |* Amateur musician *|* From cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Thu Apr 1 17:01:45 1999 Return-Path: Received: from sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil (sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil [132.250.84.38]) by mc.lcs.mit.edu (8.9.1a/8.9.1-mod) with SMTP id RAA05680 for ; Thu, 1 Apr 1999 17:01:45 -0500 (EST) Precedence: bulk Errors-To: cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu From: Andrew John Walker Message-Id: <199904010348.NAA17158@wumpus.its.uow.edu.au> Subject: Mike Reid's Solver To: cube-lovers@ai.mit.edu Date: Thu, 1 Apr 1999 13:48:23 +1000 (EST) If anyone has compiled a PC version of Mike Reid's program set to find optimal solutions in the face turn metric please contact me (or better still the list). Andrew Walker From cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Fri Apr 2 03:11:29 1999 Return-Path: Received: from sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil (sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil [132.250.84.38]) by mc.lcs.mit.edu (8.9.1a/8.9.1-mod) with SMTP id DAA06917 for ; Fri, 2 Apr 1999 03:11:29 -0500 (EST) Message-Id: <199904020811.DAA06917@mc.lcs.mit.edu> Precedence: bulk Errors-To: cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Date: Thu, 1 Apr 1999 15:56:33 -0500 (EST) From: Dale Newfield Reply-To: DNewfield@cs.Virginia.edu To: "Cube Lovers (E-mail)" Subject: Re: Spaceball (tm) input to a Cube simulator In-Reply-To: On Thu, 1 Apr 1999, Nicholas Bodley wrote: > If anyone has a Spaceball, it should make quite a nice input device. > It senses both torque about all 3 orthog. axes, and linear > displacement forces ditto; a total of 6 channels. Displacement could > select a layer, which could be highlighted (anyone for alpha-channel > translucency?), and torque would rotate the selected layer. Except that it is typically quite difficult to separately control translation and rotation with these devices. -Dale From cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Sun Apr 4 18:06:09 1999 Return-Path: Received: from sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil (sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil [132.250.84.38]) by mc.lcs.mit.edu (8.9.1a/8.9.1-mod) with SMTP id SAA15332 for ; Sun, 4 Apr 1999 18:06:09 -0400 (EDT) Precedence: bulk Errors-To: cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu To: cube-lovers@ai.mit.edu From: whuang@ugcs.caltech.edu (Wei-Hwa Huang) Subject: Keyboard cube [WAS Re: Wrist pains] Date: 3 Apr 1999 00:22:20 GMT Organization: California Institute of Technology, Pasadena Message-Id: <7e3mvs$q14@gap.cco.caltech.edu> References: "Noel Dillabough" writes: >Any ideas would be appreciated and I'll try my best to implement the best >one. If simulators "felt" like a cube when you used them they would be more >fun (and move without jamming etc) Immediately after reading this mail, my concept of a "keyboard interface" almost popped up immediately. It is similar to the 1-9 keypad interface mentioned already. [Assume that the person is using a standard American QWERTY keyboard; remap if necessary.] First, represent the front face by q w e a s d z x c A "move" is represented by any two ordered keystrokes. If the two keystrokes are in the same row, it represents a horizontal layer moving, else if they're in the same row, it represents a vertical layer moving. Example: "ed" = R' "cd" = R "sd" = slice move "we" = U' "qe" = U' "qw" = U' This method does not have moves for rotating the three front to back layers nor 180-degree moves. Extension A: Make a gap of a key represent a 180-degree move. So, "qe" is now U2 instead of just U'. Extension B: Represent front-to-back layers by the unused key combinations. This will necessarily be idiomatic (so I don't like it). For example, you could have "knight moves" represent F and B turns, and combinations with the "s" be slice moves. Extension C: Add another grid for the right side of the cube: r t y f g h v b n This solves the problem of the front-to-back layers nicely, and adds some redundancy. Most cube programs should display more than one face to the user anyway! Extension D: Use the arrow keys to rotate the entire cube. This can be done by the right hand while the left hand is just turning faces, which is similar to how a lot of people solve the cube anyway. This also alleviates the problem of the front-to-back layers. I would implement all extensions, but leave A and B as "optional" for the user to turn off as desired. -- Wei-Hwa Huang, whuang@ugcs.caltech.edu, http://www.ugcs.caltech.edu/~whuang/ --------------------------------------------------------------------------- She ran by screaming "No, I run by moving my feet rapidly, you idiot!" From cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Mon Apr 5 14:06:24 1999 Return-Path: Received: from sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil (sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil [132.250.84.38]) by mc.lcs.mit.edu (8.9.1a/8.9.1-mod) with SMTP id OAA17906 for ; Mon, 5 Apr 1999 14:06:24 -0400 (EDT) Precedence: bulk Errors-To: cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Message-Id: <3706F677.EDD8C59E@okanagan.net> Date: Sat, 03 Apr 1999 21:19:54 -0800 From: karen loewen Reply-To: loewens@okanagan.net To: cube-Lovers@ai.mit.edu Subject: square-1 and megeminx Is there a world record for the the 4x4x4 and the 5x5x5 rubiks cubes? If so what is it? I was wondering what in your opinion is the hardest rubiks like cube available right now. On a web page several people from rated the greatest to least in difficulty: 1)square-1 2)megaminx 3)5x5x5 4)4x4x4 5)? 6)? Anyway it went something like that. Would you agree? I learnt how to do square-1 all by myself. Would you consider Square-1 one of the hardest cubes to do? If so would this be considered good of me to learn? Although I only tried about 4 times my record when it was in a cube is 2 minutes. Do you know of a world record for Square-1 or any good websites? Do you know what an average would be for the best time? (perhaps 90 seconds for those really into it?) I was wondering how this compares to others times and acomplishments. At http://byrden.com/puzzles/ I almost figured out the megaminx. I got everything except the last row. Is the Megaminx one of the hardest Rubiks like puzzles available? After I get bored of my 5x5x5 that I orderd thinking about buying the megaminx. Do you know of a world record on the megaminx? What would be a average time (perhaps 3-4 minutes?) If you are not sure of answers thats fine. Then do you know of any good websites I can go to? Thank you very much. From cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Mon Apr 5 14:57:39 1999 Return-Path: Received: from sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil (sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil [132.250.84.38]) by mc.lcs.mit.edu (8.9.1a/8.9.1-mod) with SMTP id OAA18074 for ; Mon, 5 Apr 1999 14:57:38 -0400 (EDT) Precedence: bulk Errors-To: cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Message-Id: <3707EF11.3F51A90@t-online.de> Date: Mon, 05 Apr 1999 01:00:33 +0200 Reply-To: Rainer.adS.BERA_GmbH@t-online.de Organization: BERA Softwaretechnik GmbH To: Andrew John Walker Cc: cube-lovers@ai.mit.edu Subject: Re: Mike Reid's Solver References: <199904010348.NAA17158@wumpus.its.uow.edu.au> From: Rainer.adS.BERA_GmbH@t-online.de (Rainer aus dem Spring) I have-the version that requires 80MB, NOT the version that requires 800MB :) Rainer adS Andrew John Walker wrote: > > If anyone has compiled a PC version of Mike Reid's program > set to find optimal solutions in the face turn metric please > contact me (or better still the list). > > Andrew Walker -- -------------------------------------------------------------------------- Rainer aus dem Spring email Rainer.adS.BERA_GmbH@t-online.de (home) Schimmelbuschstr. 10 email TEEADS@TEE.toshiba.de (business only) 40699 Erkrath tel. +49 (0)02104 35157 (private) Germany tel. +49 (0)02104 936150 (business) --------------------------------------------------------------------------- From cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Mon Apr 5 21:30:54 1999 Return-Path: Received: from sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil (sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil [132.250.84.38]) by mc.lcs.mit.edu (8.9.1a/8.9.1-mod) with SMTP id VAA18890 for ; Mon, 5 Apr 1999 21:30:53 -0400 (EDT) Precedence: bulk Errors-To: cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Message-Id: <3707EE0F.73ED160F@ibm.net> Date: Sun, 04 Apr 1999 15:56:15 -0700 From: "Jin 'Time Traveler' Kim" Reply-To: chrono@ibm.net To: cube-lovers@ai.mit.edu Subject: Re: Spaceball (tm) input to a Cube simulator References: If anybody wants a SpaceOrb 360 (for experimentation please, I generally don't just give away stuff out of the kindness of my heart, although that's not unknown either) just drop me an email with a mailing address. I still have the box around here somewhere, just don't remember where. If I dig around long enough I know I can find the instructions too. I don't have it in front of me, but I'm sure it's just a serial device like a mouse. Nicholas Bodley wrote: > > If anyone has a Spaceball, it should make quite a nice input device. > It senses both torque about all 3 orthog. axes, and linear > displacement forces ditto; a total of 6 channels. Displacement could > select a layer, which could be highlighted (anyone for alpha-channel > translucency?), and torque would rotate the selected layer. -- Jin "Time Traveler" Kim chrono@ibm.net http://www.chrono.org '95 PGT - SCPOC From cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Mon Apr 5 22:59:11 1999 Return-Path: Received: from sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil (sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil [132.250.84.38]) by mc.lcs.mit.edu (8.9.1a/8.9.1-mod) with SMTP id WAA19027 for ; Mon, 5 Apr 1999 22:59:10 -0400 (EDT) Precedence: bulk Errors-To: cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Reply-To: From: "John Burkhardt" To: "Cube-Lovers (E-mail)" Subject: Different versions of the Ideal cube Date: Mon, 5 Apr 1999 08:23:22 -0400 Message-Id: <000e01be7f5f$19623600$3cca8018@octopod.ne.mediaone.net> Recently I've acquired a couple of older cubes from ebay. One was sold as "the original rubik's cube" by Ideal. When I opened it up I noticed that the quality was not the same as my original cube that I bought in 1980 or so. The stickers were not as bright for one thing. On my "original" cube the orange stickers are almost fluorescent, whereas on this version the color is dull, and its not a faded version of the original color. Its clearly a different shade of orange. The yellow and green colors are not as bright. And then there is the center white sticker. On some older Ideal cubes there is a logo on it, on this one I just got the logo was a separate decal. On my 1980's cube there is no logo at all. Next we come to differences in the actual pieces. On some Ideal cubes the cubies are solid, well, probably hollow in the center, but there is no openining. But on others there is an opening. Does anyone know anything about the history of the Ideal cube? Were there different runs of production? Did they start "cutting corners" to lower cost? Is there any way to tell from the packaging, which cube is the version that has the nice bright colors? Sorry if this has been discussed in the past, I'm relatively new to this list... [ Moderator: The archives have quite a bit about various types of cubes. Are you sure the open-corner cubes were from Ideal? I thought those were the pirated knockoffs. ] -JRB From cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Tue Apr 6 14:31:56 1999 Return-Path: Received: from sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil (sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil [132.250.84.38]) by mc.lcs.mit.edu (8.9.1a/8.9.1-mod) with SMTP id OAA21857 for ; Tue, 6 Apr 1999 14:31:55 -0400 (EDT) Precedence: bulk Errors-To: cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu From: wheeler@cipr.rpi.edu (Frederick W. Wheeler) Message-Id: <14088.45800.718995.311244@cipr.no_spam.rpi.edu> Date: Mon, 5 Apr 1999 08:56:08 -0400 (EDT) To: Cube-Lovers@ai.mit.edu Subject: Re: Inventing your own techniques In-Reply-To: <14080.1711.289304.134028@cipr.no_spam.rpi.edu> References: <14080.1711.289304.134028@cipr.no_spam.rpi.edu> Dear Cube-Lovers list: I received several very interesting replies to my e-mail last week regarding inventing techniques to solving cube puzzles. Here are some excerpts of note that were e-mailed to me but not the list. First, part of what I wrote ... Fred Wheeler writes: > For me, the most fun, and the ultimate challenge, in cubing comes > from figuring out how to solve the puzzle in the first place. I'd > really like to hear from people on this list on how you go about > inventing new moves and techniques or how you feel about learning to > solve a puzzle on your own. Wei-Hwa Huang sent me this teaser about conjugation. whuang@ugcs.caltech.edu (Wei-Hwa Huang) wrote: > After I understood conjugation well enough, I have never invented a > move that I can in all honesty call "new" -- although they may > appear "new" to others. The only new part is just applying it to > different types of moves and seeing what the result is. Later, at my request, Wei-Hwa Huang was kind enough to elaborate on conjugation. whuang@ugcs.caltech.edu (Wei-Hwa Huang) wrote: > I keep on meaning to write a more detailed explanation but can never > seem to find the time. > > Essentially, by conjugation I mean taking two routines (call 'em A > and B), consider their reverses (a and b), and juxtapose them (do > the move ABab). When A and B have a small intersection the results > of the conjugation is a simple permutation. And pretty much more > cube puzzles can be solved if you have the simplest permutations. > > Eg, to rotate two corner pieces, let > A = R'DRFDF' (rotate one corner in the top face without affecting > the rest of the top face) > B = U (rotate the top face) > > As A and B have a small intersection (one corner cubie), the move > ABA'B' is quite useful. > > Note that A is itself a move arrived at by conjugation. Tom Magliery also has a system for discovering solution techniques. Tom Magliery wrote: > rather than telling you my actual operation for fixing the "switched wings" > problem on the 4x and 5x cubes, i'll tell you how i discovered it: one of > the things i experiment with is repeated applications of short(ish) > sequences of moves. for example, i'll just take a particular 2 or 3-move > sequence, and apply it over and over again until the cube arrives back at a > state very similar to (but hopefully slightly different than) where it was > when i started. i was doing this (starting from a solved cube) one day > when i discovered with much jubilation that i had arrived at a state with > one switched wing pair. (there was also another slight jumble, but i > already knew an independent move to fix that by itself.) I also received a good suggestion that discovering new sequences may be easier on a computer simulator. This, way the cube can be reset to the solved state quickly before each new attempt to make it easier to see what the trial sequence actually changes. Unfortunately, I lost this particular e-mail and forget who sent it, so I cannot attribute it. My apologies to the author. Regards, Fred Wheeler -- Fred Wheeler wheeler@cipr.rpi.edu www.cipr.rpi.edu/wheeler From cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Wed Apr 7 16:04:40 1999 Return-Path: Received: from sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil (sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil [132.250.84.38]) by mc.lcs.mit.edu (8.9.1a/8.9.1-mod) with SMTP id QAA26207 for ; Wed, 7 Apr 1999 16:04:40 -0400 (EDT) Precedence: bulk Errors-To: cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Message-Id: <003001be7fad$445a7040$53c4b0c2@home> From: roger.broadie@iclweb.com (Roger Broadie) To: "Cube Lovers (E-mail)" Subject: Re: Keyboard cube [was: Re: Wrist pains] Date: Mon, 5 Apr 1999 21:57:13 +0100 For anyone who is interested in trying out a simulator that can be operated in an instant-response keyboard mode, I have christened my web-pages by uploading a copy of my cube simulator. In this mode, the function keys do face, centre-slice and whole-cube turns for the 3x3x3, and alphabetic keys can also be used for the same purpose. L, U, F and R are assigned to F5 to F8, so it's reasonably easy to work up a rhythm. Squares and inverses are done with Shift and Control, though as Jerry Bryan pointed out repeated jabbing is at least as easy. These keys also work for 4x4x4 and 5x5x5 cubes, with the alphabetic keys b f u d l r used for the off-centre slices. I mainly wrote the simulator to show me the effects of turns in Singmaster notation and common variants such as are found in cube-lovers. It's in Qbasic, which is the limit of my knowledge, and is a lot less sophisticated in appearance than the simulators available on the web - no mouse operations and no nice visible turning of the layers while you watch for instance, and distinctly rudimentary interactions with external files - so I am not offering it to the world in general, but it does have some features I haven't seen elsewhere that may appeal to Cube-lovers readers. Among them are that it can be set to show the effect of the turns on the centre pieces: it shows their orientation as little clock-hands that point to 12 o'clock in their home positions. The orientation of each piece's pointer then allows its identity to be deduced. I don't really feel I've understood the effects of a sequence unless I can see what it does to the centres. Also (this is a party trick, really) it can be set to work as a cube with any number of pieces per edge from two to 15, using an extension of normal Singmaster notation - no keyboard mode for these cubes. The program can be downloaded from home.iclweb.com/icl1/roger.broadie I won't necessarily keep it there all that long. Roger Broadie From cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Wed Apr 7 16:33:55 1999 Return-Path: Received: from sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil (sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil [132.250.84.38]) by mc.lcs.mit.edu (8.9.1a/8.9.1-mod) with SMTP id QAA26292 for ; Wed, 7 Apr 1999 16:33:55 -0400 (EDT) Precedence: bulk Errors-To: cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Reply-To: From: "John Burkhardt" To: "'Cube-Lovers (E-mail)'" Subject: RE: Different versions of the Ideal cube Date: Tue, 6 Apr 1999 06:29:31 -0400 Message-Id: <001001be8018$5c165350$3cca8018@octopod.ne.mediaone.net> > [ Moderator: The archives have quite a bit about various types of > cubes. Are you sure the open-corner cubes were from Ideal? I > thought those were the pirated knockoffs. ] > Yes, I'm sure the open corner cubes I have are Ideal. Unless the pirates put them in Ideal boxes. I own three Ideal cubes. I also have a siamese cube, which looks like it started life as regular Ideal cubes and those corners are closed. And the new OddzOn cubes are solid too. -JRB From cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Wed Apr 7 17:25:37 1999 Return-Path: Received: from sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil (sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil [132.250.84.38]) by mc.lcs.mit.edu (8.9.1a/8.9.1-mod) with SMTP id RAA26422 for ; Wed, 7 Apr 1999 17:25:36 -0400 (EDT) Precedence: bulk Errors-To: cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Message-Id: <4.1.19990404175025.02471a60@pop.ncsa.uiuc.edu> Date: Sun, 04 Apr 1999 18:12:32 -0500 To: cube-lovers@ai.mit.edu From: Tom Magliery Subject: Fwd: Keyboard cube [WAS Re: Wrist pains] >From: whuang@ugcs.caltech.edu (Wei-Hwa Huang) >First, represent the front face by > >q w e >a s d >z x c > >A "move" is represented by any two ordered keystrokes. If the two keystrokes >are in the same row, it represents a horizontal layer moving, else >if they're in the same row, it represents a vertical layer moving. ^^^ you meant to say "column" here > >Example: > "ed" = R' > "cd" = R > "sd" = slice move > "we" = U' > "qe" = U' > "qw" = U' this is sort of a grab-and-move interface (in my mental picture, one keypress "grabs" a face, and the next "moves" it). i think i might like this paradigm better than my own suggestion of before (unshifted single keystrokes for face moves, shifted single keystrokes for cube rotations). one nice advantage is that it makes it as easy on the keyboard interface as it is in real life to do RL' and R'L, for which i suspect most people's mental model is really a single turn of the middle slice. i think i'd prefer some different key assignments than wei-hwa suggests, though. for example, i think i'd like to "grab" with the middle key in the line, and then "move" with the outer one. for example: "de" = R "dc" = R' (according to wei-hwa's definition of "move", our two suggestions are compatible. mine only adds redundancy.) >This method does not have moves for rotating the three front to back layers >nor 180-degree moves. another suggestion for 180-degree moves: allow the user to tap the second key in the sequence 2 (or 3) times for 180 (or 270 aka 90') degree moves. thus, e.g., "wee" = U2. this is intuitive not only to me: someone else posted that in their keyboard interface of years ago, they didn't use the specially-assigned 180 keys, but in practice just tapped the 90-keys twice anyway. an additional suggested extension: let me do things with both hands! (this is my favorite aspect of my own keyboard interface, posted a few days ago.) perhaps a similar nonad(?) of keys could be used for R-face-relative operations analogous to the F-face-relative ones above. this is like wei-hwa's extension C, except i'd rather use my right hand in its "normal" typing position. how about a third set, in the middle of the keyboard somewhere, for doing D-relative things? mag -- ///X Tom Magliery, Research Programmer 217-333-3198 .---o \\\ NCSA, 605 E. Springfield O- mag@ncsa.uiuc.edu `-O-. /// Champaign, IL 61820 http://sdg.ncsa.uiuc.edu/~mag/ o---' From cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Wed Apr 7 18:00:36 1999 Return-Path: Received: from sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil (sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil [132.250.84.38]) by mc.lcs.mit.edu (8.9.1a/8.9.1-mod) with SMTP id SAA26538 for ; Wed, 7 Apr 1999 18:00:36 -0400 (EDT) Precedence: bulk Errors-To: cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Date: Mon, 5 Apr 1999 00:49:14 -0400 (EDT) From: der Mouse Message-Id: <199904050449.AAA08526@Twig.Rodents.Montreal.QC.CA> To: cube-lovers@ai.mit.edu Subject: Re: Keyboard cube [WAS Re: Wrist pains] > [Assume that the person is using a standard American QWERTY keyboard; > remap if necessary.] Gotcha. And your idea seems sound. But... > Extension D: Use the arrow keys to rotate the entire cube. Arrow keys are sufficiently nonstandard I would very much prefer something else - say, a shifted slice move to rotate the whole cube. (Under some reasonable circumstances it can be hard to even tell what you'll see for "the arrow keys", if they even exist.) In passing, > Extension C: Add another grid for the right side of the cube: > r t y > f g h > v b n I'd probably prefer u i o j k l m , . I might even argue in favor of w e r / s d f / x c v for the other set, simply because they're the home keys for the three principal fingers of the left hand. Other than that, it sounds like an eminently reasonable approach. der Mouse mouse@rodents.montreal.qc.ca 7D C8 61 52 5D E7 2D 39 4E F1 31 3E E8 B3 27 4B From cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Wed Apr 7 18:42:26 1999 Return-Path: Received: from sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil (sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil [132.250.84.38]) by mc.lcs.mit.edu (8.9.1a/8.9.1-mod) with SMTP id SAA26689 for ; Wed, 7 Apr 1999 18:42:25 -0400 (EDT) Precedence: bulk Errors-To: cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Message-Id: <19990406235847.6438.rocketmail@web601.yahoomail.com> Date: Tue, 6 Apr 1999 16:58:47 -0700 (PDT) From: Han Wen Subject: Re: Keyboard cube [Layout for Speed Cubing] To: noel@mud.ca Cc: Cube Lovers Hi, This is a very interesting problem. I've been scratching my head for a while, and I've cooked up with a keyboard combination that could work for virtual speed cubing. I tried to follow a few guidelines: speed cubing friendly; ergonomic and intuitive. There are of course, two types of rotations that are required to solve the cube: body rotations (rotate the whole cube) and slice rotations (rotate individual faces). For each type of rotation there are three additional sub-types. For body rotations, there are three axes x, y and z. For slice rotations, there are 1/4-turn clockwise, 1/4-turn counterclockwise and 1/2-turn. Let's define the three body axes as follows: the z-axis will intersect the U and D faces. The x-axis will intersect the F and B faces. The y-axis will intersect the R and L faces. Okay, now ergonomics. When I solve the cube, I notice that my left hand does most of the body rotations and my right hand does most of the slice rotations. I tried to keep this intuition in assigning keyboard keys by making the left hand perform body rotations and the right hand perform slice rotations (well, sort of...). The most intuitive form that I could think of for your hands to be in is the fetal or "clawed" position. This can be satisfied by placing the left-hand fingers on the A, W, E and F keys and right-hand fingers on the J, I, O and ; keys (assuming a QWERTY keyboard layout). To be speed cubing friendly, these 8 fingers should never have to leave these keyboard key assignments. __________________________________________________________________________________ For body rotations, the keyboard key assignments could be: F - clockwise body rotation about the y-axis (i.e. if we were rotating a face it would be R) E - clockwise body rotation about the x-axis (i.e. if we were rotating a face it would be F) W - clockwise body rotation about the z-axis (i.e. if we were rotating a face it would be U) To perform a counter-clockwise body rotation, hit the SPACEBAR key with the right thumb in combination with the key assigment (e.g. F and SPACEBAR) __________________________________________________________________________________ For the slice rotations, the keyboard 2-key assignments could be: F and J - 1/4-turn clockwise of the L-face F and I - 1/4-turn clockwise of the R-face F and O - 1/4-turn clockwise of R-face and 1/4-turn counterclockwise of the L-face E and J - 1/4-turn clockwise of the F-face E and I - 1/4-turn clockwise of the B-face E and O - 1/4-turn clockwise of the F-face and 1/4-turn counterclockwise of the B-face W and J - 1/4-turn clockwise of the U-face W and I - 1/4-turn clockwise of the D-face W and O - 1/4-turn clockwise of the U-face and 1/4-turn counterclockwise of the D-face To perform 1/4-turn counterclockwise slice rotations, hit the SPACEBAR key with the right thumb in combination with the 2-key assignment (e.g. F and J and SPACEBAR) To perform 1/2-turn slice rotations, hit the N key with the right thumb in combination with the 2-key assignment (e.g. F and J and N) __________________________________________________________________________________ I've ordered the keys in order of their importance. As you can see the J key is responsible for "LEFT-LIKE" slice rotations I key is responsible for "RIGHT-LIKE" slice rotations O key is responsible for middle slice rotations You might ask, why make O the middle slice and not I, since it's the middle key? Well, when you actually solve the cube, you never move the middle slice. You only move the left and right slices to effectively move the middle slice. Furthermore, this operation is performed much more seldomly than normal R and L slice rotations. Anyways, you can see with this keyboard mapping you only need a total of 8 keys to perform all of possible rotations you need to solve the cube. If we really want to make this speed cubing friendly we could also do the following: -body rotations should be performed in real-time; the speed of rotation should be an adjustable constant that the user can tweak to his or her preference -slice rotations should be instantaneous. There's really no point in watching a slice rotate. Just wasting time... > "Noel Dillabough" writes: > >Any ideas would be appreciated and I'll try my best > to implement the best > >one. If simulators "felt" like a cube when you > used them they would be more > >fun (and move without jamming etc) > === _________________________________________________________ Dr. Han Wen Applied Materials 3100 Bowers Ave, MS 1158 Santa Clara, CA 95054 e-mail: Han_Wen@amat.com / hansker@yahoo.com From cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Wed Apr 7 21:38:40 1999 Return-Path: Received: from sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil (sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil [132.250.84.38]) by mc.lcs.mit.edu (8.9.1a/8.9.1-mod) with SMTP id VAA27186 for ; Wed, 7 Apr 1999 21:38:39 -0400 (EDT) Precedence: bulk Errors-To: cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu From: Jerry Bryan To: Cube Lovers Subject: Re : Re: Inventing your own techniques In-Reply-To: <14088.45800.718995.311244@cipr.no_spam.rpi.edu> Message-Id: Date: Tue, 6 Apr 1999 20:49:37 -0400 (Eastern Daylight Time) On Mon, 05 Apr 1999 08:56:08 -0400 (EDT) "Frederick W. Wheeler" wrote: > Wei-Hwa Huang sent me this teaser about conjugation. > > whuang@ugcs.caltech.edu (Wei-Hwa Huang) wrote: > > After I understood conjugation well enough, I have never invented a > > move that I can in all honesty call "new" -- although they may > > appear "new" to others. The only new part is just applying it to > > different types of moves and seeing what the result is. > > Later, at my request, Wei-Hwa Huang was kind enough to elaborate on > conjugation. > > whuang@ugcs.caltech.edu (Wei-Hwa Huang) wrote: > > I keep on meaning to write a more detailed explanation but can never > > seem to find the time. > > > > Essentially, by conjugation I mean taking two routines (call 'em A > > and B), consider their reverses (a and b), and juxtapose them (do > > the move ABab). When A and B have a small intersection the results > > of the conjugation is a simple permutation. And pretty much more > > cube puzzles can be solved if you have the simplest permutations. > > > > Eg, to rotate two corner pieces, let > > A = R'DRFDF' (rotate one corner in the top face without affecting > > the rest of the top face) > > B = U (rotate the top face) > > > > As A and B have a small intersection (one corner cubie), the move > > ABA'B' is quite useful. > > > > Note that A is itself a move arrived at by conjugation. There are two separate ideas here. A process of the form XYX'Y' is called a commutator rather than a conjugate. As you say, a commutator which moves very few cubies can be a very useful process. In fact, the number of cubies moved by XYX'Y' can be used as a sort of informal measure of how close X and Y come to commuting. In the extreme case where X and Y do commute, we have XYX'Y'=YXX'Y'=YY'=I so that no cubies are moved. And conversely, two processes X and Y which "nearly" commute and/or which intersect in very few cubies are good candidates for forming a useful commutator. A process of the form Y'XY is called a conjugate, and in particular is called the conjugate of X by Y. Note that YXY' is also a conjugate, and in particular is called the conjugate of X by Y'. This can be a little confusing because a few books (incorrectly in my opinion) call YXY' the conjugate of X by Y. Of Y and Y', which is the "real" process and which is the inverse is totally arbitrary. For example, if Z=Y', then Z'=Y. So we could write a conjugate as YXZ (the conjugate of X by Z) and another conjugate as ZXY (the conjugate of X by Y) if we know that Y and Z are respectively the inverses of each other. It is sometimes said that the conjugate Y'XY results in X shifted by Y, which is the real utility of using conjugates to solve a cube. Use a process you know, but shift it to apply to a slightly different set of cubies. Your process A=R'DRFDF' consists of the conjugates R'DR (the conjugate of D by R) and FDF' (the conjugate of D by F'). It is often the case that useful processes can be formed from both commutators and conjugates. I am perversely proud that my own personal solution technique for solving the cube consists of only two processes -- one for the corners and one for the edges -- plus conjugates of those two processes. I think it is indicative of the power of conjugates that a cube can be solved with so few processes provided only that they are combined with conjugation. I am "perversely proud" because my "two processes" technique probably yields one of the slowest solution times of anybody on Cube-Lovers. I am always embarrassed to read about those people who can do it in under 30 seconds. I have taught myself some of the faster techniques, but I always find that after a few months the only technique my hands can remember is the old, slow one which I invented myself many years ago. ---------------------------------------- Jerry Bryan jbryan@pstcc.cc.tn.us From cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Thu Apr 8 11:48:13 1999 Return-Path: Received: from sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil (sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil [132.250.84.38]) by mc.lcs.mit.edu (8.9.1a/8.9.1-mod) with SMTP id LAA29548 for ; Thu, 8 Apr 1999 11:48:12 -0400 (EDT) Precedence: bulk Errors-To: cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu From: WaVeReBeL@webtv.net Date: Wed, 7 Apr 1999 09:02:51 -0700 (PDT) To: Cube-Lovers@ai.mit.edu Subject: Re: Keyboard cube [WAS Re: Wrist pains] Message-Id: <28684-370B81AB-994@mailtod-123.bryant.webtv.net> In-Reply-To: whuang@ugcs.caltech.edu (Wei-Hwa Huang)'s message of 3 Apr 1999 00:22:20 GMT How about giving the player a choice between using a default configuration, or customizing his/her own buttons, like in certain home video games such as Street Fighter? Another cool feature would be two simultaneous cubes, so players can battle head to head, also like Street Fighter. (I really like Street Fighter) -Alex Montilla- From cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Thu Apr 8 12:10:06 1999 Return-Path: Received: from sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil (sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil [132.250.84.38]) by mc.lcs.mit.edu (8.9.1a/8.9.1-mod) with SMTP id MAA29589 for ; Thu, 8 Apr 1999 12:10:05 -0400 (EDT) Precedence: bulk Errors-To: cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Reply-To: From: "Noel Dillabough" To: Subject: SpaceOrb 360 and Simulators Date: Wed, 7 Apr 1999 13:16:14 -0400 Message-Id: <000001be811a$572c33c0$020a0a0a@pprodual> I added support for the SpaceOrb 360 by SpaceTec to Puzzler, grab this version at: http://www.mud.ca/puzzler/Puzzler.EXE You must have a SpaceOrb 360 to try it out, but it is very very nice to use compared to the mouse. Twist the orb to rotate the puzzle, and press the buttons and twist to do moves. After a little practice you'll be able to solve a cube like it was in your hands! Only the cubes (all sizes) have support for the SpaceOrb, I may add support for the other puzzles at a later date. -Noel Dillabough From cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Thu Apr 8 13:14:00 1999 Return-Path: Received: from sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil (sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil [132.250.84.38]) by mc.lcs.mit.edu (8.9.1a/8.9.1-mod) with SMTP id NAA29818 for ; Thu, 8 Apr 1999 13:13:59 -0400 (EDT) Precedence: bulk Errors-To: cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu From: Andrew John Walker Message-Id: <199904080113.LAA02581@wumpus.its.uow.edu.au> Subject: Solvers To: cube-lovers@ai.mit.edu Date: Thu, 8 Apr 1999 11:13:10 +1000 (EST) Regarding Mike Reid's program, I compiled it fine with DJGPP, an MSDOS compiler, but it didn't run. Any ideas? I'll probably get a windows compiler soon. Anyway, two other points I was thinking of recently. Firstly, do any of the kociemba algorithm search programs use the fact that you can perform a depth n search by 3 depth n-1 searches using the 3 orthogonal orientations? (if my logic is correct!) This is because if you are using the group for the final phase, the last move of any depth n sequence must end in a square move, in which case the n-1 will easily find it, or else a quarter turn in which case the three orientations are required to make it found in the second phase. Unfortuneately I doubt the n-1 searches could be replaced by n-2 searches. Also when a cube is being scrambled adjacent cubes tend to stay together for a while. Has this been of any use in search methods? (eg. to help prune the search tree). Obvously a sequence like F2 B2 U2 D2 L2 R2 separates all adjoining pairs, but there is still a high degree of order with next to adjacent cubes, so maybe they could be used as well. Andrew Walker From cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Thu Apr 8 20:23:30 1999 Return-Path: Received: from sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil (sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil [132.250.84.38]) by mc.lcs.mit.edu (8.9.1a/8.9.1-mod) with SMTP id UAA01802 for ; Thu, 8 Apr 1999 20:23:29 -0400 (EDT) Precedence: bulk Errors-To: cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Date: Thu, 8 Apr 99 19:45:22 EDT Message-Id: <9904082345.AA16179@aic.nrl.navy.mil> From: Dan Hoey To: Jerry Bryan , Cube Lovers Subject: Conjugation done right [Re: Inventing your own techniques] First, let's make sure everyone remembers that we're using X' as an abbreviation for X^(-1) for inverses of permutations. People really should read the archives, at so they know this sort of thing, but that's getting to be a lot to ask. Still, remember that address, because it's a good place to go for things you forgot about the list (in fact, it would be nice if the README mentioned that cube-lovers-request@ai.mit.edu is the e-mail address for administrative requests to the list management, just in case someone loses their greeting message.) Jerry Bryan wrote: > A process of the form Y'XY is called a conjugate, and in particular is called > the conjugate of X by Y. Note that YXY' is also a conjugate, and in particular > is called the conjugate of X by Y'. This can be a little confusing because a > few books (incorrectly in my opinion) call YXY' the conjugate of X by Y. I tried to explain this a while ago, but it's such a subtle, counterintuitive point that I had better try again. One form of conjugate is correct, and the other form is incorrect, but just which is correct depends on how you write function composition. The point is that there are two schools of function composition, "leftward" and "rightward", and the choice of your function composition determines how you define conjugates. It's surprising that a notational convention can have this sort of effect, but we'll see it does. First, I'll describe the two schools of composition. It will be convenient to consider a set X and two permutations f and g on X. Let h:X->X be the unique permutation that satisfies h(x) = f(g(x)) for all x in X. We could let f, g, and h be any functions, not just permutations, but we will need for them to be permutations later, when we use the group structure. How do we write h in terms of f and g? The rightward school says h = g f. This is the way we have been writing things on cube-lovers all along: we write g f for applying a permutation g to something and then applying f to the result. But remember that we write h(x) = f(g(x)), which is to say that (g f)(x) = f(g(x)). The fact that the order of f and g depends on the parenthesization is often considered ugly, so some seriously rightward people write the function name after the arguments: That is to say, they write (x)f instead of f(x), (x)g instead of g(x), and (x)h = ((x)g)f = (x)(g f). This makes function composition a kind of associative law. If you're seeing this for the first time, I'm sure you consider it a bizarre and useless and gratuitously confusing complication, but I assure you that rightward functions are in wide use in some branches of the mathematical community, chiefly in abstract algebra. But cube-lovers was started by computer programmers, not algebraists, and programmers have f(x) very tightly wired into their minds and parsers. So cube-lovers uses rightward composition with leftward functions, and we say (g f)(x) = f(g(x)). As for swapping the order of f and g, we just get over it, but there are some people out there who will call us disfunctional. The leftward composition school takes a different approach: they say h(x)=f(g(x)) means h = f g. When you follow a cube process written by these people, you have to perform it from the right to the left. This is also a little hard to get used to, but at least we have an "associative" rule, (f g)(x) = f(g(x)), with f and g in the same order, without having to write our functions after the arguments. For this reason, most mathematicians other than algebraists find leftward composition to be more natural. You probably learned leftward composition in calculus or whenever. But on cube-lovers no-one wanted to write all their cube processes from right to left, so we've pretty much forgotten about leftward composition on the list. Remember, though, leftward composition is pretty standard for a lot of mathematics, and it works better for the way we write functions, so you can't really call it wrong. And there are people who say that if we are going to write our functions to the left we also ought to compose them to the left. So far so good. The rightward and leftward schools write the composition of functions in opposite orders, but either way the permutations still form a group under composition. As long as you don't mix them, it shouldn't change anything else, should it? But it really does change the definition of conjugation. (Remember conjugation? This is a message about conjugation.) Suppose we have a group G, not necessarily a permutation group. Conjugation is one way of mapping G to a permutation group, where the set being permuted is the set of group elements of G. For an element s, I'll define the right conjugate of s, R_s, as the permutation for which R_s(g) = s' g s for all g in G. Similarly, the left conjugate of s, L_s is defined by L_s(g) = s g s' for all g. It's important to notice that in either case, conjugation by a product is the composition of conjugations. For letting s and t be two specific elements of G, we can carry out manipulations that hold for all elements g of G. I'll calculate with the left conjugate in the left column and the right conjugate in the right column: L_s(g) = s g s'; R_s(g) = s' g s; L_t(g) = t g t'; R_t(g) = t' g t; L_st(g) = (st) g (st)' R_st(g) = (st)' g (st) = s t g t' s' = t' s' g s t = L_s(t g t') = R_t(s' g s) = L_s(L_t(g)) = R_t(R_s(g)) (*) These calculations were carried out using the group operation of G, independently of how we write function composition. But let's look at how we write the composition in our two notations. In the rightward composition that cube-lovers has been using all along, (*) shows that L_st = L_t L_s and R_st = R_s R_t. So the mapping s |-> L_s is an _antihomomorphism_--it reverses the order of multiplication--but s |-> R_s is a homomorphism. Homomorphisms are a lot nicer than antihomomorphisms, so we should use right conjugation all the time, right? But consider the people who use leftward composition, (f g)(x)=f(g(x)). So the function composition in (*) is now written L_st = L_s L_t and R_st = R_t R_s. So with leftward composition, _left_ conjugation is the homomorphism, and _right_ conjugation is the antihomomorphism. It is so very convenient for conjugation to be a homomorphism that people who use rightward composition always use right conjugation, and people who use leftward composition always use left conjugation (unless they think it doesn't matter and guess wrong). We're rightward composers on cube-lovers, so conjugation by s is g |-> s' t s, but remember that most math texts (other than algebra) will use the leftward composition, and so they will correctly use left conjugation, g |-> s g s'. I learned this from Jim Saxe, when I tried using left conjugation in the Symmetry and Local Maxima message. Jim told me that unless I wanted to start using leftward composition I had better use right conjugation, but I was pretty sure it really didn't matter. Jim just splained and splained until he got across how much it really does matter, and why the only right answer is different in different books. Now I've done it for you, and I hope it helps. And they said that consistency was the hobgoblin of little minds.... Dan Hoey@AIC.NRL.Navy.Mil From cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Fri Apr 9 13:06:46 1999 Return-Path: Received: from sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil (sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil [132.250.84.38]) by mc.lcs.mit.edu (8.9.1a/8.9.1-mod) with SMTP id NAA05235 for ; Fri, 9 Apr 1999 13:06:45 -0400 (EDT) Precedence: bulk Errors-To: cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Message-Id: <000701be8238$8c026820$92121fc8@lucentmd> From: "Jorge E. Jaramillo" To: "cube" , Subject: Cube program by Roger Broadie Date: Thu, 8 Apr 1999 22:24:23 -0500 I'd like to say that the cube program from Mr. Broadie is quite nice, actually is something I have been searching for for a while and something I requested to several Web based cube programers and never found, the ability to have a sequence interfase is something very useful mostly when you are looking for patterns and you find these lists on the web that don't show the actual result but just describe it with some sort of complicated notation, trying to do it with a real cube is a real pain since you have to do all the moves and if you make a mistake you have to start all over again by solving the cube and then making the moves that would take you to the final pattern. Well done Mr. Broadie and keep up the good work, please let the list know when you have the Windows version ready. ;-) ======= Jorge E. Jaramillo jejarami@usa.net Cut the chain and chase the dream Savatage 1984 From cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Fri Apr 9 13:52:13 1999 Return-Path: Received: from sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil (sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil [132.250.84.38]) by mc.lcs.mit.edu (8.9.1a/8.9.1-mod) with SMTP id NAA05408 for ; Fri, 9 Apr 1999 13:52:13 -0400 (EDT) Precedence: bulk Errors-To: cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu From: WaVeReBeL@webtv.net Date: Sat, 27 Mar 1999 00:03:32 -0800 (PST) To: Cube-Lovers@ai.mit.edu Subject: Lubricant Message-Id: <10861-36FC90D4-6028@mailtod-121.bryant.webtv.net> Many people have suggested different lubricants on their web pages. Many have referred to silicon. Where can I get this? What other ones are good? Where can I find them? -Alex Montilla- [Moderator's note: I skipped sending this message two weeks ago because discussing cube lubrication with someone complaining of RSI symptoms seemed like a bad idea. Then I got a large pile of interface-related messages. But now that the backlog is mostly sent out, we might want to return to considering what lubricants to use. The lubes I remember from the archives are vaseline (greasy, erodes plastic slowly), soap (temporary), candle wax (drips flakes), and molybdenum disulfide (doesn't help, destroys cube quickly). The only silicone product I've used is Armor-All, which is a protectant that provides a very little lubrication. Does anyone know what silicone Alex is discussing? Any other good ideas on lubricants? -- Dan ] From cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Fri Apr 9 17:58:59 1999 Return-Path: Received: from sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil (sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil [132.250.84.38]) by mc.lcs.mit.edu (8.9.1a/8.9.1-mod) with SMTP id RAA07206 for ; Fri, 9 Apr 1999 17:58:59 -0400 (EDT) Precedence: bulk Errors-To: cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Message-Id: <370E49B3.E058A9D8@u.washington.edu> Date: Fri, 09 Apr 1999 18:40:51 +0000 From: David Barr To: cube-lovers@ai.mit.edu Subject: Re: Lubricant References: <10861-36FC90D4-6028@mailtod-121.bryant.webtv.net> > [ ... Does anyone know what silicone > Alex is discussing? Any other good ideas on lubricants? -- Dan ] I think most auto parts stores sell a silicone spray lubricant. I don't know what the brand names are. I have used this on my cubes and it works well. After you first apply it, the cube will seem stiff, but if you keep turning it for a while it starts working. David From cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Fri Apr 9 19:43:01 1999 Return-Path: Received: from sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil (sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil [132.250.84.38]) by mc.lcs.mit.edu (8.9.1a/8.9.1-mod) with SMTP id TAA08480 for ; Fri, 9 Apr 1999 19:43:00 -0400 (EDT) Precedence: bulk Errors-To: cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu From: Jerry Bryan To: "Jorge E. Jaramillo" Cc: cube , Roger.Broadie@iclweb.com Subject: Cube Explorer 1.5 by Herbert Kociemba In-Reply-To: <000701be8238$8c026820$92121fc8@lucentmd> Message-Id: Date: Fri, 9 Apr 1999 18:04:29 -0400 (Eastern Daylight Time) On Thu, 08 Apr 1999 22:24:23 -0500 "Jorge E. Jaramillo" wrote: > Well done Mr. Broadie and keep up the good work, please let the list know > when you have the Windows version ready. ;-) Another alternative for Windows is Herbert Kociemba's Cube Explorer 1.5, which is easily found with Web based search engines, and which I think can also be found on the download section of the Cube-Lovers site. Cube Explorer 1.5 does not allow you to type in a maneuver directly, which I think is what you are after. But it will do something just about as good, and in some ways even better. It will read in a standard ASCII text file which contains maneuvers in standard Singmaster notation (the BFUDLR notation), and it will then show you the end product. The file can contain any (reasonable) number of maneuvers, and the program will show you the end product for each maneuver all in one fell swoop (or swell foop, if you prefer). One thing Cube Explorer 1.5 does not support that you may be looking for is to manipulate the cube and look at each intermediate position. But that's usually not what I am looking for. I am usually looking for the end product of a maneuver. (Of course, you could put each intermediate position into your ASCII text file.) You can create the ASCII text file for Cube Explorer 1.5 by typing maneuvers into the file with the text editor of your choice. But most typically I just cut and paste maneuvers out of an E-mail into the text file, and then have Cube Explorer 1.5 read the file. It's much easier and less error prone than typing the maneuvers myself. Here is a case where Cube Explorer 1.5 may be "even better". Take a Cube-Lovers message with lots of maneuvers, cut and paste the whole thing into an ASCII text file, and read the file into Cube Explorer 1.5. Instantly, you see the positions for all the maneuvers. You don't even have to worry about deleting the extraneous non-maneuver text from the E-mail. For example, take Mike Reid's lists of minimal maneuvers for highly symmetric positions, or take my lists of local maxima and put them into Cube Explorer 1.5 in this fashion. The results are quite pretty. There are many other messages in the Cube-Lovers archives with lots of pretty patterns, but these two come to mind quickly. (By the way, converting BFUDLR strings to a graphical representation of a position is an extremely useful feature of Cube Explorer 1.5, but it has several other nice features. For example, you can give it a graphical representation of a position and get back very quickly -- in a matter of seconds -- a very good suboptimal maneuver for that position.) ---------------------------------------- Jerry Bryan jbryan@pstcc.cc.tn.us From cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Mon Apr 12 12:16:29 1999 Return-Path: Received: from sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil (sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil [132.250.84.38]) by mc.lcs.mit.edu (8.9.1a/8.9.1-mod) with SMTP id MAA15917 for ; Mon, 12 Apr 1999 12:16:28 -0400 (EDT) Precedence: bulk Errors-To: cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Date: Fri, 9 Apr 1999 19:06:08 -0400 (EDT) From: der Mouse Message-Id: <199904092306.TAA25503@Twig.Rodents.Montreal.QC.CA> To: Cube-Lovers@ai.mit.edu Subject: Re: Lubricant > Many people have suggested different lubricants on their web pages. > Many have referred to silicon. Silicon in its (relatively) pure form is somewhat difficult to get hold of and probably not a very good lubricant. You probably mean silicone. > [Moderator's note: [...] Any other good ideas on lubricants? -- Dan ] I don't know how well it works - I haven't perceived a need for lubricants for my Cubes - but one I wouldn't write off without trying is graphite, available easily and cheaply as pencil lead, the softer the pencil the better. The major downside I would expect is black dust rubbing off on fingers and to a lesser extent everything you set the Cube down on. (But it's a kind of black dust that washes off easily.) der Mouse mouse@rodents.montreal.qc.ca 7D C8 61 52 5D E7 2D 39 4E F1 31 3E E8 B3 27 4B [Moderator's note: John Bailey also advises graphite, applied carefully and sparingly.] From cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Mon Apr 12 14:10:19 1999 Return-Path: Received: from sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil (sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil [132.250.84.38]) by mc.lcs.mit.edu (8.9.1a/8.9.1-mod) with SMTP id OAA16364 for ; Mon, 12 Apr 1999 14:10:19 -0400 (EDT) Precedence: bulk Errors-To: cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Date: Sat, 10 Apr 1999 00:38:26 -0400 (EDT) From: Nicholas Bodley To: WaVeReBeL@webtv.net Cc: Cube-Lovers@ai.mit.edu Subject: Re: Lubricant In-Reply-To: <10861-36FC90D4-6028@mailtod-121.bryant.webtv.net> Message-Id: On Sat, 27 Mar 1999 WaVeReBeL@webtv.net wrote: }Many people have suggested different lubricants on their web pages. }Many have referred to silicon. Where can I get this? What other ones }are good? Where can I find them? White powder, used like graphite, sometimes for locks? Possibly Tri-Flow (tm), which (iirc) is a Teflon (tm) particle suspension. I experimented with quite a variety of lubricants, found a good one, and then one of the periodic disruptions of my life came along and I failed to note which it was! :( "Teflon" is a Du Pont trade name for PTFE, polytetrafluoroethylene. Btw, in case you do a Web search, watch "silicon" vs. "silicone". The chemist who coined the term "silicone" was wildly optimistic about people's ability to keep the two straight. Silicon, the chemical element, is gray, opaque to visible light, brittle like glass, and a lousy lubricant. You don't normally see it, nor can you normally buy it. Silicones are chemical compounds that include the chemical element, silicon. |* Nicholas Bodley *|* Autodidact & Polymath * Electronic Tech. (ret.) |* Waltham, Mass. *|* ----------------------------------------------- |* nbodley@tiac.net *|* Silicon oil and grease do not exist. |* Amateur musician *|* IC chips made of silicone do not exist. -------------------------------------------------------------------------- From cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Mon Apr 12 17:15:33 1999 Return-Path: Received: from sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil (sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil [132.250.84.38]) by mc.lcs.mit.edu (8.9.1a/8.9.1-mod) with SMTP id RAA18027 for ; Mon, 12 Apr 1999 17:15:32 -0400 (EDT) Precedence: bulk Errors-To: cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Date: Sat, 10 Apr 1999 02:39:35 -0400 (EDT) From: der Mouse Message-Id: <199904100639.CAA26973@Twig.Rodents.Montreal.QC.CA> To: Cube-Lovers@ai.mit.edu Subject: Cube-manipulation programs Well, with the current discussion going on about Cube manipulation programs, I'll toss out my minor contribution the genre. It's a C program that takes simple text lines describing maneuvers and prints out a text representation of the resulting cube, together with its cycle structure. (I specifically chose to make it text-only because I'm comparatively often on text-only links.) It also allows you to define names for operations and then use them as primitives. A sample transcript, which defines the Spratt wrench as an operator and then uses it to flip the four F-face edges: > .set WRENCH (SLICER F)4 `WRENCH' defined > WRENCH F2 WRENCH F2 Cube: u u u u u u u f u l l l f u f r r r b b b l l f l f r f r r b b b l l l f d f r r r b b b d f d d d d d d d Cycles: (uf)+ (lf)+ (fr)+ (fd)+ [2] Already centered > Another example: > F SLICER F' Cube: u f u u f u u u u l l l f f f r r r b l b l l f r d d b r r b u b l l l f f f r r r b u b d d d d b d d b d Cycles: (u,b,d,f) (ub,bd,rf,fl) [4] Centred: (ul,fl,fu,df,bd,rd,rb,ru,rf,dl,bl) (ulb,flu,dlf,bld) (ubr,fur,dfr,bdr) [44] > The numbers in [ ] are the smallest power to which that operator must be raised to get the identity. While I don't expect it ever attain the popularity of slick graphics programs, there may be a few people interested in it; if anyone is, you have only to drop me a line asking for a copy.... der Mouse mouse@rodents.montreal.qc.ca 7D C8 61 52 5D E7 2D 39 4E F1 31 3E E8 B3 27 4B From cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Mon Apr 12 21:07:29 1999 Return-Path: Received: from sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil (sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil [132.250.84.38]) by mc.lcs.mit.edu (8.9.1a/8.9.1-mod) with SMTP id VAA18436 for ; Mon, 12 Apr 1999 21:07:29 -0400 (EDT) Precedence: bulk Errors-To: cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Reply-To: From: "Noel Dillabough" To: "Cube Lovers List (E-mail)" Subject: Cube moves macros in simulators Date: Sat, 10 Apr 1999 10:17:49 -0400 Message-Id: <000a01be8362$9646ab40$040a0a0a@laptop> In-Reply-To: It seems my help file is poorly written, I've gotten some surprise replies from people who I have told... On Friday, April 09, 1999 6:04 PM Jerry Bryan [mailto:jbryan@pstcc.cc.tn.us] wrote: >Cube Explorer 1.5 does not allow you to type in a maneuver directly, which I >think is what you are after. Puzzler does support cube move macros, in standard UDFBLR notation (use udfblr in lowercase for inner slices and meM for central slices in the 5x5x5 cube). To use this feature hit enter and enter the move...F2 will move the F slice 2 times, F3 and F' are equivalent and will move counterclockwise 1 time, F1 and F move clockwise 1 time. You can enter any number of moves in sequence in a string then by hitting enter again the move will be executed. One more note: these macros assume the cube is oriented so that you can see three faces (exactly like the initial orientation of the cube). So F refers the the bottom left face, R is the bottom right face and U is the upper face. /\ / \ |\U /| | \/ | \F|R/ \|/ Last note: I assumed that UDFBLR was the notation used by most people. However if there is another notation that is used or if some other notation is required for experimentation, let me know and I'll put it in. -Noel From cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Tue Apr 13 12:28:58 1999 Return-Path: Received: from sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil (sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil [132.250.84.38]) by mc.lcs.mit.edu (8.9.1a/8.9.1-mod) with SMTP id MAA20809 for ; Tue, 13 Apr 1999 12:28:58 -0400 (EDT) Precedence: bulk Errors-To: cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Message-Id: <37134515.4AD5@zeta.org.au> Date: Tue, 13 Apr 1999 23:22:29 +1000 From: Wayne Johnson Reply-To: sausage@zeta.org.au To: Cube-Lovers@ai.mit.edu Subject: Building a twisty puzzle I have been in the process of building plans for a twisty puzzle that is no longer available. I have been re-doing the design for a few weeks now and I want to start molding or crafting the pieces soon. This is where I am coming undone. I believe I will have some success crafting the three different pieces required using clay, and filing back the pieces once dry. >From here, I believe making plaster cast molds of the clay pieces will allow me to start making all the identical pieces. Now, the problem... what can I use to fill the mold? Can I use plastics or a type of resin? I would greatly appreciate any ideas or input. I'll be posting the design on my site as soon as they are nearing completion. Maybe I can get comments on whether the whole thing will work at all. Many thanks, Wayne www.zeta.org.au/~sausage [ Moderator's note: Should this turn out to be a puzzle covered by a patent, I'll have to drop discussion of the subject. It is my under- standing that construction of patented objects is an infringement even if the object is made for personal use, and even if the patent holder has ceased production. But I have no objections to the general topic of materials and construction techniques suitable for puzzles, though if any subscribers find this drifting too far from the topic, please let cube-lovers-request@ai.mit.edu know. --Dan ] From cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Tue Apr 13 13:25:11 1999 Return-Path: Received: from sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil (sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil [132.250.84.38]) by mc.lcs.mit.edu (8.9.1a/8.9.1-mod) with SMTP id NAA21055 for ; Tue, 13 Apr 1999 13:25:10 -0400 (EDT) Precedence: bulk Errors-To: cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Date: Tue, 13 Apr 1999 16:19:14 +0100 From: David Singmaster Computing To: noel@mud.ca Cc: cube-lovers@ai.mit.edu Message-Id: <009D6951.D5AB9641.72@ice.sbu.ac.uk> Subject: RE: Wrist pains When I went to a meeting on RSI problems, the speaker mentioned 'mouse finger' which is about as debilitating as the white finger suffered by people who use pneumatic drills (or jack-hammers). When the speaker went to one small computer design firm, she found two people suffering from it, one having essentially lost the use of his right hand and having had to change to using his left hand! DAVID SINGMASTER, Professor of Mathematics and Metagrobologist School of Computing, Information Systems and Mathematics Southbank University, London, SE1 0AA, UK. Tel: 0171-815 7411; fax: 0171-815 7499; email: zingmast or David.Singmaster @sbu.ac.uk From cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Wed Apr 14 22:38:03 1999 Return-Path: Received: from sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil (sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil [132.250.84.38]) by mc.lcs.mit.edu (8.9.1a/8.9.1-mod) with SMTP id WAA26294 for ; Wed, 14 Apr 1999 22:38:03 -0400 (EDT) Precedence: bulk Errors-To: cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Date: Tue, 13 Apr 1999 16:46:33 +0100 From: David Singmaster Computing To: mag@ncsa.uiuc.edu Cc: cube-lovers@ai.mit.edu Message-Id: <009D6955.A6FEB505.56@ice.sbu.ac.uk> Subject: Re: Keyboard cube [was: Re: Wrist pains] Re: Tom Magliery's representation of the cube. A form of this was used by Kathleen Ollerenshaw in the early 1980s, but she also had all but the center facelet of the back face folded out to form an additional square ring around the figure so one knew what everything was. DAVID SINGMASTER, Professor of Mathematics and Metagrobologist School of Computing, Information Systems and Mathematics Southbank University, London, SE1 0AA, UK. Tel: 0171-815 7411; fax: 0171-815 7499; email: zingmast or David.Singmaster @sbu.ac.uk [Moderator's note: I couldn't help myself: ................................................. : : : : : : : : : +---------+---------------+---------+ : : |`. \ / .'| : : | `+.......\.........../.......+' | : : | :`. \ / .': | : : | : `+.....\......./.....+' : | : :.....+ : :`. \ / .': : +.....: : |`..: : `+---+---+---+' : :..'| : : | :`..: | : : | :..': | : : | : :`..+...:...:...+..': : | : : | : : | : : | : : | : : | : : ..+...:...:...+.. : : | : : | : ..:' | : : | `:.. : | : : | ..:' : +---+---+---+ : `:.. | : :.....+' : : .' / \ `. : : `+.....: : | : :'..../.......\....`: : | : : | : .' / \ `. : | : : | :'....../...........\......`. | : : | .' / \ `. | : : +'--------+---------------+--------`+ : : : : : : : : : :...............:...............:...............: I think something like this appears in Winning Ways, too. --Dan ] From cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Thu Apr 15 16:59:24 1999 Return-Path: Received: from sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil (sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil [132.250.84.38]) by mc.lcs.mit.edu (8.9.1a/8.9.1-mod) with SMTP id QAA29551 for ; Thu, 15 Apr 1999 16:59:24 -0400 (EDT) Precedence: bulk Errors-To: cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Date: Wed, 14 Apr 1999 15:44:11 +0100 From: David Singmaster Computing To: jburkhardt@mediaone.net Cc: cube-lovers@ai.mit.edu Message-Id: <009D6A16.1B1880B4.26@ice.sbu.ac.uk> Subject: RE: Different versions of the Ideal cube Ideal certainly did use oriental suppliers when the Great Cube Craze was on and I recall several qualities of cube appeared here. I can't remember for sure if they ever sold the open cornered versions. I definitely don't recall examples with markedly different colors. When Rubik's Fourth Dimension was launched here, I saw that they were using distinctly poor quality cubes, presumably from China or thereabouts. One person at the launch said hers broke within an hour. DAVID SINGMASTER, Professor of Mathematics and Metagrobologist School of Computing, Information Systems and Mathematics Southbank University, London, SE1 0AA, UK. Tel: 0171-815 7411; fax: 0171-815 7499; email: zingmast or David.Singmaster @sbu.ac.uk From cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Thu Apr 15 19:31:56 1999 Return-Path: Received: from sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil (sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil [132.250.84.38]) by mc.lcs.mit.edu (8.9.1a/8.9.1-mod) with SMTP id TAA00230 for ; Thu, 15 Apr 1999 19:31:55 -0400 (EDT) Precedence: bulk Errors-To: cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu From: Douglas Zander Message-Id: <199904142338.SAA14966@solaria.sol.net> Subject: Building a twisty puzzle (fwd) To: cube-lovers@ai.mit.edu (cube) Date: Wed, 14 Apr 99 18:38:20 CDT In the US there exists a magazine called, "Inventor's Digest" which I have a subscribtion to and which is currently running a series of articles about building prototypes from molds. It would probably be just what you are looking for. It explains the whole process. If you want, I can get subscription information for you or information on how to order individual articles. You may wish to look in your local library to see if they carry the magazine (au = australia?) but I'm not sure your country would carry it. If you want I will send you excerpts just ask. (is this something the whole list would want to find out about?) -- Douglas Zander | dzander@solaria.sol.net | Shorewood, Wisconsin, USA | [ Moderator's note: I doubt we have that many molder/fabricator people on the list (but I could be wrong). It's also somewhat questionable how large typed-in excerpts can be before we run into copyright problems. So I'd suggest people who are looking for excerpts should contact Douglas Zander at the above address. Subscription/ordering information is more generally useful and less problematic, so please send cube-lovers that info. --Dan ] From cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Thu Apr 15 20:25:17 1999 Return-Path: Received: from sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil (sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil [132.250.84.38]) by mc.lcs.mit.edu (8.9.1a/8.9.1-mod) with SMTP id UAA00392 for ; Thu, 15 Apr 1999 20:25:16 -0400 (EDT) Precedence: bulk Errors-To: cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Message-Id: <199904151407.KAA00624@livia.East.Sun.COM> Date: Thu, 15 Apr 1999 10:07:53 -0400 (EDT) From: Guy Steele - Sun Microsystems Labs Reply-To: Guy Steele - Sun Microsystems Labs Subject: Winning Ways To: cube-lovers@ai.mit.edu Cc: Guy.Steele@east.sun.com Date: Tue, 13 Apr 1999 16:46:33 +0100 From: David Singmaster Computing ... [Moderator's note: I couldn't help myself: [ Picture ] I think something like this appears in Winning Ways, too. --Dan ] I just checked my copy; it does not contain this sort of diagram for the cube, at least on the pages cited in the index for "Rubik's Cube", but it does have some very nice isometric 3-D "cutaway/see-through" diagrams of the cube. --Guy From cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Thu Apr 15 21:06:50 1999 Return-Path: Received: from sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil (sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil [132.250.84.38]) by mc.lcs.mit.edu (8.9.1a/8.9.1-mod) with SMTP id VAA00504 for ; Thu, 15 Apr 1999 21:06:50 -0400 (EDT) Precedence: bulk Errors-To: cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Message-Id: <37165923.7ACC5D48@u.washington.edu> Date: Thu, 15 Apr 1999 21:24:51 +0000 From: David Barr To: cube-lovers@ai.mit.edu Subject: Re: Keyboard cube [was: Re: Wrist pains] References: <009D6955.A6FEB505.56@ice.sbu.ac.uk> David Singmaster Computing wrote: > > Re: Tom Magliery's representation of the cube. > A form of this was used by Kathleen Ollerenshaw in the early 1980s, but > she also had all but the center facelet of the back face folded out to form an > additional square ring around the figure so one knew what everything was. I've been playing around with something like this myself. It doesn't work yet, but you can look at http://home1.gte.net/davebarr/Cube/ I got inspired by all of the recent discussion of input methods and started thinking about visual representations. David From cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Fri Apr 16 13:08:36 1999 Return-Path: Received: from sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil (sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil [132.250.84.38]) by mc.lcs.mit.edu (8.9.1a/8.9.1-mod) with SMTP id NAA02446 for ; Fri, 16 Apr 1999 13:08:36 -0400 (EDT) Precedence: bulk Errors-To: cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu From: Douglas Zander Message-Id: <199904160046.TAA20588@solaria.sol.net> Subject: Inventor's Digest info To: cube-lovers@ai.mit.edu (cube) Date: Thu, 15 Apr 99 19:46:42 CDT Forwarded message: > [ Moderator's note: ... Subscription/ordering > information is more generally useful and less problematic, so please > send cube-lovers that info. --Dan ] Inventors' Digest Subscription Dept. PO BOX 70 Guffey CO 80820 FAX: (617) 723-6988 Email: InventorsD@aol.com WWW: www.inventorsdigest.com Volume XV, No. 1, January/February 1999 Part 1/3: "Casting Plastic Prototypes at Room Temperature" Author: Jack Lander Volume XV, No. 2, March/April 1999 Part 2/3: "Making a Rubber Mold For Casting Plastic" Volume XV, No.3, May/June 1999 Part 3/3: "Casting Plastic in Rubber Molds" -- Douglas Zander | dzander@solaria.sol.net | Shorewood, Wisconsin, USA | From cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Mon Apr 19 12:14:43 1999 Return-Path: Received: from sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil (sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil [132.250.84.38]) by mc.lcs.mit.edu (8.9.1a/8.9.1-mod) with SMTP id MAA07359 for ; Mon, 19 Apr 1999 12:14:43 -0400 (EDT) Precedence: bulk Errors-To: cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Message-Id: <3718413B.251EE6E0@okanagan.net> Date: Sat, 17 Apr 1999 00:07:29 -0800 From: karen loewen Reply-To: loewens@okanagan.net To: Cube-Lovers@ai.mit.edu Subject: Rubiks Cube, Megaminx and Square-1 Is there a world record for the the 4x4x4 and the 5x5x5 rubiks cubes? If so what is it? I was wondering what in your opinion is the hardest rubiks like cube available right now. On a web page several people from rated the greatest to least in difficulty: 1)square-1 2)megaminx 3)5x5x5 4)4x4x4 5)? 6)? Anyway it went something like that. Would you consider Square-1 one of the hardest cubes to do? If so would this be considered good of me to learn all by myself? My best time is 83 sec. As if now I am not sure what my average is. Do you know of a world record for Square-1 or any good websites? Do you know what an average would be for the best time? I was wondering how this compares to others times and accomplishments. At http://byrden.com/puzzles/ I almost figured out the megaminx. I got everything except the last row. Is the Megaminx one of the hardest Rubiks like puzzles available? After I get bored of my 5x5x5 that I ordered thinking about buying the megaminx. Do you know of a world record on the megaminx? What would be a average time (perhaps 3-4 minutes?) Currently I am more interested in the Rubiks cube. Lately I have been trying to improve my time. I have a personal record of 50 seconds, and an average time of about 80 seconds. However, I learned how to do the cube all by myself. I didn't get help from others, websites, books... I was wondering If you learned by yourself or if you got help? Then what is your time? I don't believe that I will ever get much faster. Learning by yourself is a really hard task. I was wondering if there is any one out there who agrees that getting help from resources is cheating? In my opinion they make the people who haved learned by themselves look bad. This is just my opinion, you don't have to agree. If you are not sure of answers that's fine. Then do you know of any good websites I can go to? Thank you very much. From cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Mon Apr 19 17:34:05 1999 Return-Path: Received: from sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil (sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil [132.250.84.38]) by mc.lcs.mit.edu (8.9.1a/8.9.1-mod) with SMTP id RAA07769 for ; Mon, 19 Apr 1999 17:34:05 -0400 (EDT) Precedence: bulk Errors-To: cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Date: Mon, 19 Apr 1999 15:13:27 +0100 From: David Singmaster To: jbryan@pstcc.cc.tn.us Cc: cube-lovers@ai.mit.edu Message-Id: <009D6DFF.A3A1ABCB.24@ice.sbu.ac.uk> Subject: RE: Re : Re: Inventing your own techniques The technique of solving the cube by use of commutators and conjugates is what most people worked out in the early days. However, I can testify that it took us some time to realise that one could use second level commutation. That is, FRF'R' = [F,R] only affects seven pieces, but in fact it only affects one piece in the L face, so taking the commutator with the L face produces a 3-cycle of corners. Likewise [F,R]^2 only twists one corner in the L face and combining it with turns of L allows you to twist three corners the same way or two corners opposite ways. DAVID SINGMASTER, Professor of Mathematics and Metagrobologist School of Computing, Information Systems and Mathematics Southbank University, London, SE1 0AA, UK. Tel: 0171-815 7411; fax: 0171-815 7499; email: zingmast or David.Singmaster @sbu.ac.uk From david.singmaster@sbu.ac.uk Mon Apr 19 18:35:09 1999 Return-Path: Received: from smtp.interlog.com (root@smtp.interlog.com [207.34.202.37]) by mc.lcs.mit.edu (8.9.1a/8.9.1-mod) with ESMTP id SAA07922 for ; Mon, 19 Apr 1999 18:35:09 -0400 (EDT) Received: from crii.com (209-20-9-212.dialin.interlog.com [209.20.9.212]) by smtp.interlog.com (8.9.1/8.9.1) with SMTP id SAA25968 for ; Mon, 19 Apr 1999 18:35:07 -0400 (EDT) Received: from [127.0.0.1] by crii.com [192.168.0.47] with DomainPOP (MDaemon.v2.7.SP5.R) for ; Mon, 19 Apr 1999 18:36:59 -0400 Delivered-To: cr728635@mail-00 Received: from mc.lcs.mit.edu (mc.lcs.mit.edu [18.30.0.229]) by mail.9netave.com (8.9.2/8.8.8) with ESMTP id SAA50612; Mon, 19 Apr 1999 18:25:01 -0400 (EDT) Received: from sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil (sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil [132.250.84.38]) by mc.lcs.mit.edu (8.9.1a/8.9.1-mod) with SMTP id RAA07769 for ; Mon, 19 Apr 1999 17:34:05 -0400 (EDT) Precedence: bulk Errors-To: cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Date: Mon, 19 Apr 1999 15:13:27 +0100 From: David Singmaster To: jbryan@pstcc.cc.tn.us Cc: cube-lovers@ai.mit.edu Message-Id: <009D6DFF.A3A1ABCB.24@ice.sbu.ac.uk> Subject: RE: Re : Re: Inventing your own techniques X-MDaemon-Deliver-To: cube-lovers-outbound@mc.lcs.mit.edu The technique of solving the cube by use of commutators and conjugates is what most people worked out in the early days. However, I can testify that it took us some time to realise that one could use second level commutation. That is, FRF'R' = [F,R] only affects seven pieces, but in fact it only affects one piece in the L face, so taking the commutator with the L face produces a 3-cycle of corners. Likewise [F,R]^2 only twists one corner in the L face and combining it with turns of L allows you to twist three corners the same way or two corners opposite ways. DAVID SINGMASTER, Professor of Mathematics and Metagrobologist School of Computing, Information Systems and Mathematics Southbank University, London, SE1 0AA, UK. Tel: 0171-815 7411; fax: 0171-815 7499; email: zingmast or David.Singmaster @sbu.ac.uk From cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Tue Apr 20 14:22:17 1999 Return-Path: Received: from sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil (sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil [132.250.84.38]) by mc.lcs.mit.edu (8.9.1a/8.9.1-mod) with SMTP id OAA09900 for ; Tue, 20 Apr 1999 14:22:16 -0400 (EDT) Precedence: bulk Errors-To: cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Date: Mon, 19 Apr 1999 15:48:36 +0100 From: David Singmaster To: WaVeReBeL@webtv.net Cc: cube-lovers@ai.mit.edu Message-Id: <009D6E04.8CAE2B95.34@ice.sbu.ac.uk> Subject: RE: Lubricant I used to use silicone grease of the type used for O-ring seals in diving equipment, etc. I haven't seen any damage caused by this. WD-40 has also been suggested and I have used it, but I think it may damage some plastics. Note that the central spindle is often made of a different plastic than the other pieces and I think it is more subject to attack by some of the lubricants. DAVID SINGMASTER, Professor of Mathematics and Metagrobologist School of Computing, Information Systems and Mathematics Southbank University, London, SE1 0AA, UK. Tel: 0171-815 7411; fax: 0171-815 7499; email: zingmast or David.Singmaster @sbu.ac.uk From cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Thu Apr 22 11:18:36 1999 Return-Path: Received: from sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil (sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil [132.250.84.38]) by mc.lcs.mit.edu (8.9.1a/8.9.1-mod) with SMTP id LAA14447 for ; Thu, 22 Apr 1999 11:18:36 -0400 (EDT) Precedence: bulk Errors-To: cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu From: WaVeReBeL@webtv.net Date: Mon, 19 Apr 1999 16:30:06 -0700 (PDT) To: Cube-Lovers@ai.mit.edu Cc: loewens@okanagan.net Subject: Re: Rubiks Cube, Megaminx and Square-1 Message-Id: <8843-371BBC7E-10617@postoffice-123.bryant.webtv.net> In-Reply-To: karen loewen 's message of Sat, 17 Apr 1999 00:07:29 -0800 Hi, I think it's great that you learned to do the cube all by yourself. I give much respect to anyone who solved any of these twisty puzzles. Very few people have the ability and the time to figure them out. I'm curious if you are willing to share your methods? I personally learned from a book. Afterwards, I kind of wished I hadn't. Since then, I promised myself not to look at any more solutions for any new puzzles I encounter. So far, all I've managed to solve on my own is the pyraminx. (very easy compared to the cube) I can see how you might feel a little disgruntled about others achieving quick solving times with aid from outside resources. I am an example of that. In about 4 months I achieved a 36 second average after scouring the net for every bit of information I could find. You shouldn't think it makes you look bad. If anything, I feel bad knowing that people like you must put a lot of hard work into it, while I had a much easier time. It still takes a lot of hard physical and mental work on my part to achieve a fast average, but a lot of the mental work was already done for me. As far as cheating is concerned, in my and many others' defense, I must respond, as the majority of people in this group have referred to outside information at one point or another. Consider speed cubing as a sport just like any other in the Olympics. Everyone is going to use every resource available to win. No one in the Olympics is going to try and win (or succeed for that matter) all by themselves w/out any help or coaching at all. The use of outside help brings those who use it to a higher level playing field. These people are in an equal playing field among themselves having access to the same resources. If people choose to learn on their own, it is only fair to put them in a different group rather than lumping everyone in the same group. But just because people have accessed other resources, doesn't mean they will all of a sudden reach less than a minute averages, it still takes a lot of hard work to get there. I know your average is still better than a lot of people who got help. On the other hand, getting help on learning how to solve the cube might be considered cheating just as it would be when one gets hints to a riddle or looks in the back of the book for all the answers. I don't think there is anything wrong with help at all, unless your goal is to do it all on your own without any help. You said that you don't believe that you will ever get much faster. If your skill level plateaus, I don't see anything wrong with using any resources available to exceed your limits. That's what help is for! You can still be proud of your accomplishments, but everyone has their limits. There are very few people who have achieved what you have. -Alex Montilla- From cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Thu Apr 22 12:22:10 1999 Return-Path: Received: from sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil (sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil [132.250.84.38]) by mc.lcs.mit.edu (8.9.1a/8.9.1-mod) with SMTP id MAA14641 for ; Thu, 22 Apr 1999 12:22:10 -0400 (EDT) Precedence: bulk Errors-To: cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Message-Id: <3.0.32.19990420085812.009b2880@mail.spc.nl> Date: Tue, 20 Apr 1999 08:58:14 +0200 To: cube-lovers@ai.mit.edu From: Christ van Willegen Subject: RE: Re : Re: Inventing your own techniques At 15:13 19-4-1999 +0100, you wrote: > The technique of solving the cube by use of commutators and conjugates >is what most people worked out in the early days. However, I can testify that >it took us some time to realise that one could use second level commutation. >That is, FRF'R' = [F,R] only affects seven pieces, but in fact it only affects >one piece in the L face, so taking the commutator with the L face produces a >3-cycle of corners. Likewise [F,R]^2 only twists one corner in the L face >and combining it with turns of L allows you to twist three corners the same way >or two corners opposite ways. When I learned how to solve the cube (some 20 years back, I think...), I was taught a layer-by-layer solution, consisting of 'modular' moves. Most of the modularity occurs on the 3rd layer, namely: - In flipping the edges, I use (RE)^4 to flip the UR edge. Then, I move the top layer so that there's another edge to be flipped at the UR position and I repeat the same procedure. - In rotating the edges, I was taught the above-mentioned {R,F]^2 to rotate an edge by 120 degrees. Later, I 'discovered' that [F,R]^2 does the same thing backward. Most other layer-by-layer methods I've seen have formulas to flip 2 edges in the top layer, but you'll need two for the different confi- gurations. Also, these methods mostly have two, three or more formulas to rotate the edges in the toplayer, depending on configuration. My method may not be the fastest around (it takes me about 2 minutes to solve The Cube), but I don't need many formulas for it: 1st layer: on my own (make a cross, fill in the corners) 2nd layer: 2 formulas (standard layer 3 to layer 2 swing, two directions) 3rd layer: 4 (exchange edges, flip one edge, exchange corners, rotate one corner) Christ van Willegen From cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Thu Apr 22 18:11:24 1999 Return-Path: Received: from sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil (sun28.aic.nrl.navy.mil [132.250.84.38]) by mc.lcs.mit.edu (8.9.1a/8.9.1-mod) with SMTP id SAA15583 for ; Thu, 22 Apr 1999 18:11:23 -0400 (EDT) Precedence: bulk Errors-To: cube-lovers-errors@mc.lcs.mit.edu Message-Id: From: Paddy Duncan To: cube-lovers@ai.mit.edu Subject: Re: Lubricant Date: Tue, 20 Apr 1999 21:27:31 +0100 WD-40 will make it stick REALLY badly! Please don't do it. Not because it will dissolve the plastic (although it might), but because it's too thin. Also I have seen in the past a problem with the kind of solvents in this kind of product where it seems to 'realise' any small cracks in plastic, causing it to just fall to bits the next day. Silicone grease sounds good to me. Paddy Duncan Systems Engineer Intralan (UK) Ltd [ Moderator's note: I'll remind you that last month Alex Montilla suggested (for low-quality tiled cubes), "If you use WD-40, it'll eat away at the plastic resulting in really smooth turning. It'll be great for about 3-4 weeks of daily cubing, but the WD-40 will take its toll,