Category: Rubik’s Cube

Posted on

Here’s the Trick to Solving a Rubik’s Cube

A Hungarian professor named Erno Rubik invented the Rubik’s Cube in 1974, and get this – he didn’t realize he was making a puzzle at all until he accidentally scrambled it up and couldn’t fix it.

“It was a code I myself had invented, yet I could not read it,” he famously said.

It took him a month to solve his own puzzle, which he eventually did by first rearranging each side’s corners to match.

Luckily for you (not him) the internet now exists to tell you how to solve the infamous Cube.

David Singmaster’s layer-by-layer method for solving the Rubik’s Cube was the first to be published, and it’s still the most common method to teach beginners. He basically introduces algorithms – which here means a memorized sequence of moves that will have a specific effect on the Cube’s position – to cube solving.

In fact, all of the methods people use today require you to memorize a series of algorithms and to execute them in a specific order to solve the Cube.

There is more than one set of algorithms you can use to get to the end, and being able to finish a cube is not the same as being able to do it quickly. The way people speed up their solving is by memorizing lots of algorithms and then quickly determining the right algorithm to use in any given Cube situation.

In 1982, an American teenager, Minh Thai, solved the Rubik’s Cube in under 23 seconds, and eventually wrote a book called The Winning Solution that revealed his corners-first method.

In 1997, Jessica Friedrich and her method – later coined CFOP – set the gold standard for quickness, and in 2019, the current world record is just 3.47 seconds.

You can find YouTube videos for both the layer-by-layer method, CFOP, and just about all of the others, as well as pages with detailed instructions. It can seem daunting at first, but if you stick with it, you’ll see there’s a method to the madness, and solving the Cube isn’t about smarts, but memorization and determination.

Solving it fast is a different story, so if you’re after that world record, best of luck.

If you decide to have a go at it sans instructions, though, I’d set your sights on beating Erno Rubik’s time of a month.

And best of luck with that, too.

The post Here’s the Trick to Solving a Rubik’s Cube appeared first on UberFacts.

Posted on

Use These 5 Simple Steps to Solve a Rubik’s Cube

I’ve never even picked up a Rubik’s cube with the intention of actually solving it because I’m pretty sure you’re not going to be able to do it.

So watching someone else solve one with a few simple twists has always seemed pretty impressive, right? Or at least, you assume they’re much smarter than you and much better at things like math and puzzles and the like, yeah?

It turns out that’s not necessarily true.

Because what if they’re not figuring it out, but have simply memorized the best and fastest way to make the colors and sides line up?

It turns out that you, too, can impress your friends at parties – if you have the ability to memorize a few simple steps.

Reddit user CitizenYellow shared this simple infographic that lays out the step-by-step guide to solving the Cube. It’s broken into 5 parts and includes illustrations for each one, and if you follow them, you’ll end up with all of the colors on their separate sides.

How To: Solve A Rubik’s Cube from coolguides

There are actually more algorithms that can be used to solve the Rubik’s Cube without too much of a headache, but this one is simple and the infographic means that, after you practice a few times, it should be like second nature.

Then, you can work on your speed – if you want to beat the world’s best time, you’ll need to do it faster than 4.69 seconds.

The post Use These 5 Simple Steps to Solve a Rubik’s Cube appeared first on UberFacts.