Standardised Grip Nomenclature

Ignore this if it's been done already, but I'm not aware of any standard terms to describe the position of your hand while holding the cube. So I'm going to attempt to come up with one, which hopefully will make it easier to describe finger tricks and such like.

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Main Positions:-
Front grip: Thumb is placed on front face (e.g. FR cubie), fingers are on the back face.
Top grip: Thumb is placed on the upper face, fingers on the bottom (for example, if your right hand was in a front grip, doing an R turn would put your hand in this position).
Bottom grip: Thumb is placed on the down face, fingers on the upper face (an R' away from a right hand front grip).
Back grip: Thumb is on the back face, fingers on the front face.

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Sub-Positions:-
The back grip can be held in one of two ways (if you need to sub-catagorise it)-
1. Over (back grip): Positioned as if you started in a right hand front grip and did a clockwise R2.
2. Under (back grip): Positioned as if you started in a right hand front grip and performed an R2'

The front grip can also have a couple of variations for grips that allow double layer U and D turns. Typically your thumb will be gripping the middle cubbie of the face it's on, however you can also have...
1. Upper (front grip): Thumb is on the top cubbie on the front face, one finger will typically be gripping the top back cubbie. This allows for unobstructed d/d' turns
2. Lower (front grip): Thumb is placed on the bottom cubbie of the front face, and a finger grips the bottom cubbie on the back face. This allows free use of u/u' turns.

Note 1. The examples given refer to the 3x3 cube, however relative positions can be used on other sized cubes. For example, for a 4x4 cube 'upper' could refer to the top half of the cube and 'lower' the bottom half, rather than holding specific cubbies.
Note 2. Upper and Lower grips can also be applied to the other standard grips, in which case an an Upper top grip would be holding the cubies furthest away from you (an R turn makes a right upper front grip become an upper top grip). The Upper bottom grip would be holding the cubies closest to you (an R' away from an upper front grip). The only tricky one is an upper back grip, which would still be holding the cubies on the U layer, NOT an R2 away from an upper front grip.

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To summerise, this gives a simple naming convention for standard ways of holding the cube based on gripping a face with your thumb on the opposite side from your fingers. The names come from the position of your thumb. They can apply to either hand.

OK, I think that's everything. Does anyone have any suggestions or refinements, or know of anything I've missed?

I appreciate what you're trying to do here...

Currently, people usually say something like "start with index finger on URF," and the thumb is implied, which is straightforward enough. Perhaps if you distill your nomenclature down to some nice abbreviations it would seem more advantageous to use.

I think that it would be interesting to try to combine algorithm notation and a grip notation so that you can see exactly how a specific algorithm is to be performed.

For example, with this OLL:
R2' U' R F R' U R2 U' R' F' R

Somehow notate that you are to start in a front grip, U' with your left index, do the U with a right ring finger push, and the F' with a right index push, etc.

What you have now would be a nice nomenclature system for right-hand grip, but the idea made me think of something like this. I'm wondering how difficult it would be to combine algorithm notation with grip notation.

Also, your grip notation could simply be added in brackets at the point in the algorithm that a regrip is needed.

For example, a Y perm (F R U' R' U' R U R' F' R U R' U' R' F R F') could be rewritten as something like this:

<D> F R U R' U' R U R' F' R U R' U' <F> R' F R F'

Or something similar. It could be confusing when the algorithm and grip notations overlap in symbols, so perhaps the grip notation could be reworked to not contain any move notation symbols.

Edit: I apologize for the poor organization in this post. I was somewhat hurried.

This is a very interesting idea and would be very useful.

I have lost count of the number of algorithms I learned and executed with regrips until seeing another cuber execute them in a video. Some triggers are more obvious (RUR'U') as to where finger placement should be, whilst other combinations are not apparent, yet there are much better ways of executing.

Occasionally you will see some execution indication in an algorithm, such as R2', instead of R2 which is trying to advise best way.

Certainly notation that included moves and grip would immediately allow cubers to see if a particular alg is actually better for them.

Selkie said:

I have lost count of the number of algorithms I learned and executed with regrips until seeing another cuber execute them in a video. Some triggers are more obvious (RUR'U') as to where finger placement should be, whilst other combinations are not apparent, yet there are much better ways of executing.

Click to expand...

Precisely. For example, I used to do sune with a bottom/under grip, which forces a regrip after the R U R'. But one day, I was messing around with it, trying to figure out how to do it without a regrip (since I had heard people saying that they did it without one), and I found out that you can do it regripless with a front grip. I was intrigued.

Ooh, that's some great ideas. I love the little <F> brackets. I'll ponder this more over the weekend to see if I can get the system nice and simple.

Godmil said:

Ooh, that's some great ideas. I love the little <F> brackets. I'll ponder this more over the weekend to see if I can get the system nice and simple.

Click to expand...

What about super-(or sub-)scripts to signify which finger to use for specific moves, and whether to use a push or a pull? For example:

<D> R U7 R' U'4

I would use superscript, but bbcode isn't allowing me to. The problem is that the system is going to be too complicated. Imagine notating moves, grip, which fingers to use, which sticker to put your finger on, whether to push or pull, possibly your left-hand grip, etc..

I'm not sure how difficult it's going to be to strike the perfect balance between specificity and usability. I believe that there is a fine line between a useful notation and an overcomplicated, unusable one.

Xishem said:

What about super-(or sub-)scripts to signify which finger to use for specific moves, and whether to use a push or a pull? For example:

<D> R U7 R' U'4

I would use superscript, but bbcode isn't allowing me to. The problem is that the system is going to be too complicated. Imagine notating moves, grip, which fingers to use, which sticker to put your finger on, whether to push or pull, possibly your left-hand grip, etc..

I'm not sure how difficult it's going to be to strike the perfect balance between specificity and usability. I believe that there is a fine line between a useful notation and an overcomplicated, unusable one.

Click to expand...

It would be useful. When I was learning PLL I was sitting with an alg. sheet (like most others, I guess). On that alg. sheet there could have been 2 lines; 1 with the alg. to perform and 1 with the <D> R U7 R' U'4 stuff.
When I first saw the 4 G's, I thought that I would never remember those algs. but now I perform them with all kinds of crazy tricks (lowercase letters and D) Those fingertricks could have been on line#2 on the sheet.

Tperm =
D} R U R' F} U' R' F R2 U' R' U' D} R U R' F'

} for right hand repositioning and { for left hand repositioning. Thoughts?

Maybe put the bracket before the letter, so people know that it's not part of the alg?

StachuK1992 said:

Tperm =
D} R U R' F} U' R' F R2 U' R' U' D} R U R' F'

} for right hand repositioning and { for left hand repositioning. Thoughts?

Click to expand...

I like that idea, but the regrip notation still seems to confuse my brain. I'm confusing it with move notation. Perhaps the letters/symbols for grip notation should be changed to not conflict with move notation.

MaeLSTRoM said:

Maybe put the bracket before the letter, so people know that it's not part of the alg?

Click to expand...

Xishem said:

I like that idea, but the regrip notation still seems to confuse my brain. I'm confusing it with move notation. Perhaps the letters/symbols for grip notation should be changed to not conflict with move notation.

Click to expand...

}d} R U R' }f} U' R' F R2 U' R' U' }d} R U R' F'
? I'm not sure what works best here.

No one's remembering Gripper?

Lucas Garron said:

No one's remembering Gripper?

Click to expand...

of course, but I didn't like his system too well.

Here is my idea, for an ideal grip notation - reGrip™.

Can be used to easily specify both right and left-handed grips, including key finger placements, for any sized cube puzzle.

Right hand grip designated AND delimited by ">",
and Left hand grip designated AND delimited by "<"

General form of the notation for RH is >grip codes>, LH is <grip codes<

grip codes designate the position of any finger by (finger# placement, finger# placement, .....)

finger numbers:

Thumb = 0, and is assumed if no finger number is specified
Index finger = 1
Middle finger = 2
Ring finger = 3
Pinky finger = 4

placement:

Indicated by the Speffz letter(s) for that location(s).

Typical examples:

right-hand bottom grip for thumb would be >V>
also including the right-hand index finger would be >V,1C>

standard front grip for LH conveniently is <L<

upside-down U push grip for RH thumb and RH ring-finger >T,3M>

key finger placements for standard RH front grip >J,1Q,3T> or just >J> for RH thumb only.

Xishem said:

I think that it would be interesting to try to combine algorithm notation and a grip notation so that you can see exactly how a specific algorithm is to be performed.

For example, with this OLL:
R2' U' R F R' U R2 U' R' F' R

Somehow notate that you are to start in a front grip, U' with your left index, do the U with a right ring finger push, and the F' with a right index push, etc.

Click to expand...

The precise execution of that alg can be defined using -

reVolution™ + reGrip™ notation:
>J> R= <1R< U- R+ F+ R- >3M> U+ R# U- R- >1M> F- R+