# Free Edges



## isaacthecuber (Jan 1, 2008)

I've been experimenting with free edges lately and I have a problem.

Here's the system I've come up with, using the 3 cycle method. When I memorize EP, if the edge is oriented, I memorize an English number. If it is unoriented I memorize a Spanish number. I'm pretty familiar with Spanish numbers so the problem is not the language. This is decreasing my memo, but here's the problem, during execution, when I have a cycle with one unoriented edge, I don't know what to do with it? :confused: 

Would someone who uses free edges please help me out? Thanks for the help!


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## tim (Jan 1, 2008)

You have to correctly set it up. For example: UF becomes FU with R d' R.


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## Pedro (Jan 1, 2008)

I made a thread with some examples of how I solve the edges, with free setups, no orientation step

I'm not sure if it's exactly what you're doing/trying, but may help...

oh, and I don't think of the edges as "oriented" or "unoriented"...I just cycle the stickers


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## Cubegeek (Feb 15, 2008)

Check out my website:

www.cubegeek.net 

Well, lets say that your cycle is ABA

A= correctly oriented
B= incorrectly oriented

So you set up normal except you use a R or L move to setup the last piece because the previous piece is B
On my website , more useful stuff available

Cube On,
Cubegeek


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## cmhardw (Feb 15, 2008)

Hey Isaac,

I view the edges the same way, and sometimes I have a cycle with only one unoriented edge. I call this case an "unbalanced cycle" meaning the final piece of the cycle returns to the original location in the cycle, but with flipped orientation. The only way to fix is to either orient that edge with an edge in another unbalanced cycle, or just break into a new cycle at the end of the current unbalanced one. I use the latter option, if I end up with an edge at the end of a cycle that does not have balanced orientation I just throw it into another cycle. If you do this until you have solved all pieces, the buffer will always end up with the correct orientation. I don't use free edges, I use freestlye commutators, but I have a similar problem in my solving too and this fixes the problem quite easily.

P.S. I guess I don't really use freestyle commutators anymore since I am optimizing all of my commutator cycles. I won't really freestyle it anymore, since I'll eventually have a prepared alg for every possible cycle. Daniel already uses this method, but I wonder what it is going to be called? I guess optimized commutators. Anyway that is way beside the point in this thread.


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## joey (Feb 15, 2008)

Chris: That does work, and that's what I do. 
You also have to check for misoriented edges that are permuted correctly during your memo phase. I have had lots of DNFs because I have missed a piece that was oriented correctly, but permuted correctly.


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## Stefan (Feb 15, 2008)

cmhardw said:


> I guess I don't really use freestyle commutators anymore since I am optimizing all of my commutator cycles. I won't really freestyle it anymore, since I'll eventually have a prepared alg for every possible cycle. Daniel already uses this method, but I wonder what it is going to be called? I guess optimized commutators.


If you learn and practice algs anyway, why restrict yourself to commutators? Why not use the fastest algs for the cases, regardless of whether they're commutators?



joey said:


> missed a piece that was *oriented correctly*, but *permuted correctly*.


Yeah, those are real nasty.


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## Swordsman Kirby (Feb 15, 2008)

Cubegeek said:


> Check out my website:
> 
> www.cubegeek.net



Honestly, stop it!


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## joey (Feb 15, 2008)

Ooops. Thanks Stefan (and Johannes), for pointing that out. I did mean "oriented incorrectly, but permuted correctly".


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## dbeyer (Feb 16, 2008)

Stephan: The methods that we use need to be bigcube safe, hence the reason for using commutators. 

You can't do a 2-gen to cycle edges on the 5x5x5.

Later,
DB


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