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Method Shapes

A list of significant shapes that have defined the various methods. This page is influenced by, and is an extension of, Ryan Heise's page that covered some of the early method shapes.

https://www.ryanheise.com/cube/solutions_history.html

Eight Corners​

Method: Corners First

Proposer: Ernő Rubik (1974)

Twelve Edges​

Method: Edges First

Proposer: Ulrich Roddewig (1979, earliest known)

Cross​

Method: Layer By Layer, CFOP, CFCE

Proposer: Donald Taylor (1978, earliest known)

Cross + F2L Pairs​

Method: CFOP, CFCE

Proposer: John Conway, David Benson, and David Seal (1979)

Oriented State​

Method: Thistlethwaite, Kociemba, Human Thistlethwaite, MI2, SSC

Proposer: Morwen Thistlethwaite (1979-1980)

EOLine > Oriented State​

Method: MI2, SSC

Proposer: James Straughan (2011), Joseph Briggs (2015)

Layer + LL Corners​

Method: Waterman

Proposer: Marc Waterman and Daan Krammer (1981), Others prior (1979-1981)

2x2x3 Block​

Method: Petrus, early unnamed methods by Thistlethwaite and Jackson

Proposer: Morwen Thistlethwaite (1979), Bradley Jackson (1979), Lars Petrus (1981)

XCross​

Method: CFOP, CFCE, Snyder Method 2

Proposer: Anthony Snyder (1982 for Snyder Method 2), Chris Hardwick (2003 for CFOP)

Tripod​

Method: Tripod

Proposer: Ryan Heise (2002), Michael Gottlieb (2008)

Doug Li Block​

Method: Doug Li

Proposer: Doug Li (2002)

1x2x3 Block​

Method: Roux

Proposer: Gilles Roux (2003)

Four Squares​

Method: Heise

Proposer: Ryan Heise (2003)

Cross + One Corner​

Method: L2L

Proposer: Duncan Dicks (2004)

Columns​

Method: Columns First

Proposer: Various (2004, 2007, and further)

1x2x3 + adjacent 1x2x2 block​

Method: MI1

Proposer: Michael James Straughan (2006)

1x2x3 + 2x2x2 block​

Method: Nautilus, M-CELL

Proposer: Michael James Straughan (2006), Joseph Briggs (2015)

EOLine​

Method: ZZ

Proposer: Gilles Roux and Adam Géhin (~2003), Ryan Heise (2004, based on Géhin's video)

Published by: Zbigniew Zborowski (Zborowski learned of the step from others in 2004 then published in 2006)

2x2x3 + Corners​

Method: Tudor

Proposer: Kenneth Gustavsson and others (2007+), Joseph Tudor (2018)

1x2x3 + opposite 1x2x2 block​

Method: 42

Proposer: Joseph Briggs (2017)

2x2x3 + EOBelt​

Method: Mehta

Proposer: Yash Mehta (2020)

EOSquare​

Method: Squall

Proposer: Vincent Trang (2021)