Training Proposal

Hypocrism

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I'm considering attempting to design a piece of hardware that can interface (via bluetooth?) with a piece of software which would be used for training purposes.

It would be attached to a specialised cube core, so that it can detect the moves made on a cube. The moves would be sent to the software to update your turn history.

These are the uses I've thought of for it:

LL Training
Instead of applying an alg to get a LL state, and measuring your time to solve, the software will develop a random state and display it. You execute the moves (on a blank cube, or ignoring the colours on your cube) and the software will tell you if your moves were correct as well as how long your algs each took, and the delay between each. This seems to me to be a less clumsy way of improving recognition and execution times. You'll rapidly solve LL after LL without having to perform an algorithm each time-you just do moves based on what you see on-screen.

Solve breakdowns
Apply the scramble given by the software, and do a regular solve. The software will determine when you've finished cross, first pair, F2L, OLL, solve, etc. This will give a more natural breakdown of solves and help with analysis. It also would allow a TPS graph, accurate move count, pointing out of redundant moves, pointing out when your biggest pauses are, and the ability to quickly compare your moves with ideal moves for each step. Averages and suggestions for areas to train on would be easy to implement given an ideal breakdown model.


QUESTION: if this was available to purchase, or the software was available to interface with hardware that you could assemble yourself, would you train using this idea? Do you think it would be beneficial to your improvement? And would you prefer to be able to fit it onto your own cube (if possible) or would you prefer to have a cube sent to you with the hardware intact?
 
Sounds great, I would certainly try it. I really like the idea of capturing solve data for analysis. It might not be practical to fit it to my own cube, but if the cube it came with was decent enough that would be OK.
 
I think it's better if this could fit into your own cube because everyone wants to practice on the cube that feels best to them. It wouldn't make so much sense if it came attached to a cube you didn't really like using that much. Maybe it could be sold already attached to one of the cubes out there that are considered to be the best ie. Zhanchi, Weilong, Shuangren. I probably would not buy it myself because I don't like spending money if I don't need to, but that's just me.
 
Hey,

I had this idea a while ago. I actually discussed it with the ppl from seventowns at worlds 2011. They said it would cost too much to develop, and the people who benefit from it are mainly speedcubers, which is a relatively small group. However, the concept is great, and I am sure it's technically possible. I just have no idea what a device like this would cost.

I can see this being a great tool for both beginners and experts. Beginners could get hints, where on the display it will only point out the 1 or 2 relavant pieces, and a few sugested moves. It could keep track of progress, and play sounds when you succeed with a certain step (a bit like a computer game).

For the pro's, it could be used to collect perfect statistics. For instance, it could detect that you lock up on the same 7th move of that F-perm 40% of the time, and possibly suggest alternative algs.

For BLD cubers, it would be great if you have all your solves reconstructed, so you can analyse all your mistakes. (Without a reconstruction, it's a mystery what went wrong sometimes).

We need someone who can build electronic devices.. And programmers, but we have plenty of those in the community.
 
I would have thought the hardware part to be tricky to get it working perfectly, but you haven't really gone into that part of how you might try and do this...? accelerometers, not even sure if you can get these off the shelf.
Would perhaps be easier to try and instead do it all in software, extend the image analysis idea from a webcam or camera to track the cube.
 
This would no doubt be short of revolutionary, the biggest issue I see is with the hardware. How would this device fit in a cube? I could imagine 6 very small sensors that you could put in the center of a cube, which still leaves the issues of power and networking. Do you put it in the core somehow perhaps? ...
It struck me just now that perhaps the corners and edges are big enough for such a sensor. Also redundancy if one fails.

Would perhaps be easier to try and instead do it all in software, extend the image analysis idea from a webcam or camera to track the cube.
If the monitoring software knew the scramble or the initial state of the cube, that would be very possible and probably more simple in the end because you could also extend it for other cubes.
 
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This would no doubt be short of revolutionary, the biggest issue I see is with the hardware. How would this device fit in a cube? I could imagine 6 very small sensors that you could put in the center caps of a cube, which still leaves the issues of power and networking. Do you put it in the core somehow perhaps? ...
It struck me just now that perhaps the corners and edges are big enough for such a sensor.
If the monitoring software knew the scramble or the initial state of the cube, that would be very possible and probably more simple in the end. because you could extend it for other cubes.



Lucas Garron is working on automatic solve-reconstruction software. Ask him.
 
What if the system used only software?
Three 100 fps cameras around the cuber would detect the moves either by the change of color or by tracking the cuber's fingers.
This will allow the cuber to use their normal cube while practicing, the only problem is the cost of the cameras...
 
What if the system used only software?
Three 100 fps cameras around the cuber would detect the moves either by the change of color or by tracking the cuber's fingers.
This will allow the cuber to use their normal cube while practicing, the only problem is the cost of the cameras...

I don't think all the camera tech would be necessary, and finger tracking, especially in this context would be harder than it already is.
Two cameras would be enough, if they have depth sensing like the kinect then the cube could be kept track of really easily.
Although one camera could be enough, the initial state would have to be known by the tracker. Also depending on the camera angle some moves might be hard to detect because there would be no color change on the faces it sees.
 
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