From hoey@aic.nrl.navy.mil Fri Oct 28 11:38:16 1994 Return-Path: Received: from Sun0.AIC.NRL.Navy.Mil by life.ai.mit.edu (4.1/AI-4.10) for /com/archive/cube-lovers id AA29189; Fri, 28 Oct 94 11:38:16 EDT Received: by Sun0.AIC.NRL.Navy.Mil (4.1/SMI-4.0) id AA17190; Fri, 28 Oct 94 11:38:15 EDT Date: Fri, 28 Oct 94 11:38:15 EDT From: hoey@aic.nrl.navy.mil (Dan Hoey) Message-Id: <9410281538.AA17190@Sun0.AIC.NRL.Navy.Mil> To: "Cube Lovers List" Cc: "Jerry Bryan" Subject: Cube colors and face names Keywords: Rubiksong, Varga, Colors, Humor > Singmaster designates the faces as Up, Down, Right, Left, Front, and > Back. The names are chosen so that no two of the faces start with > the same letter. There have been some latter day efforts to rename > Up as Top so that all the faces have names beginning with > consonants. Yes, this is the main reason for using Top, because of the Rubiksong introduced by Varga that I described (unfortunately with many typos) on 22 Feb 90 ( is a URL that I hope works--anyone who is actually able to point and click on this, please let me know). But there's another reason. Remember the annoying feature that the color assignments to faces were never standardized? The first cube I bought had red opposite yellow, blue opposite white, and orange opposite green (I think). Even though in later days most cubes are manufactured with opposite faces ``differing by yellow''--red opposite orange, blue opposite green, and yellow opposite white--there does not seem to be a standard for the handedness of the coloring. This has long been a problem on cube-lovers, where everyone starts out asking ``I've got my cube solved except a blue sticker on the white face, a white sticker on the green face, and a green sticker on the blue face,'' and the puzzle becomes trying to figure out where those faces are. (This was fixed in Square 1, where they printed a full-color instruction book coordinated with the puzzle). My modest proposal is to define the Standard Earth-Tone Cube, which has the faces in standard and easily remembered places. The colors are taupe, dun, fawn, beige, loam, and roan. This supports the use of Top over Up, because ``taupe'' is so much more evocative than ``umber''. ``Dun'' is also a major win, and I wish I had better names for the other faces. I have yet not tried painting such a cube, because I can't figure out which color is which. Dan Hoey@AIC.NRL.Navy.Mil