Rubik Cube 40th Anniversary

This is cool stuff.

Today is the 40th anniversary of the invention of the Rubik Cube. Google commemorated it with one of their famous Google Doodles - a cube you can solve on the screen.

Here's the thing. For almost forty years, the cube's various algorithms have been available pretty much online. Anybody could learn these algorithms. Anybody could, with practice, solve the Cube.

A good site to begin learning how can be found here. This specific page describes Singmaster Notation, the shorthand notation which allows cube aficionados to translate the various moves such that they can reproduce them on their own Cubes.

Some examples of typical Cube algorithms. These concentrate on the elusive top layer.

Swap Two Adjacent Top Layer Corners

L' U' L - F U F' - L' U L U²

This swaps the FUL and BUL corners around, flips the UL and UF edges and swaps the FL and FR edges around.

Permute UFR -> UBR - UBL Corners

R U' L' U R' U' L U

This plays merry merry hob with your corners' orientations, but it keeps edges where they were.

L' U R U' L U' R' U'

This permutes LUF -> LUB -> RUB corners, and screws around with orientation and edges.

Rotate Three Corners

L' U' L U' L' U² L U²

Rotates orientation of LUF -> LUB -> RUB corners anticlockwise.

R U R' U' R U² R' U²

This rotates the corners RUF -> RUB - RUL clockwise.

Permute Three Top Layer Edges

R² U F B' R² F' B U R²

This permutes the three edges UB -> UR -> UF without flipping them.

R² U' F B' R² F' B U' R²

This permutes the three edges UB -> UF -> UR without flipping them.

More will be revealed tomorrow.