MQBE (V1.1): A Shareware Program <ASP>
MAGIC CUBE
(C) 1992, P. K. Winter, Toronto, Ont.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
[1] MQBE: OVERVIEW . . . . . . page 2
[2] SHAREWARE . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
[3] DISCLAIMER AND AGREEMENT . . . . . 4
[4] FILES . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
[5] REQUIREMENTS . . . . . . . . . . . 5
[6] PLAYING MQBE . . . . . . . . . . 6
[7] NOTES ON THE MAGIC CUBE . . . . . 7
[8] BIBLIOGRAPHY . . . . . . . . . . . 11
[9] MAINTENANCE LOG . . . . . . . . . 12
[1] MQBE: OVERVIEW
MQBE is a puzzle based on Professor Ern� Rubik's Magic Cube (called
B�v�s Kocka in Hungarian), the 20th century's most amazing puzzle.
In the late 70s and early 80s the Cube became a world-wide fad.
While fads come and go, for some of us the Magic Cube remains as
fascinating as ever. After all, there are not too many puzzles
that offer 43,252,003,274,489,856,000 patterns. To have seen all
possible patterns, if you could have viewed 1,000 patterns every
second, you would have had to start when the universe was born.
Each of the six surfaces of the cube (Top: BLUE, Bottom: WHITE,
Front: ORANGE, Back: RED, Left: GREEN, Right: YELLOW) are made
up of nine squares. The central square on each surface can never
change its position, but all of the other squares can be rearranged
as slices of the cube are rotated clockwise or counterclockwise.
When the slices are rotated, the colors on the cube's surfaces are
scrambled, reset, or pretty patterns can be created. The primary
purpose of the puzzle is this: given a random pattern, find the
minimum number of rotations that will restore the colors to their
original pristine positions.
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(C) 1992, P.K. Winter, Toronto, Ont. 2
[2] SHAREWARE
Shareware distribution gives users a chance to try software before
buying it. If you try a Shareware program and continue using it,
you are expected to register. Individual programs differ on details
-- some request registration while others require it, some specify
a maximum trial period. With registration, you get anything from
the simple right to continue using the software to an updated
program with printed manual.
Copyright laws apply to both Shareware and commercial software, and
the copyright holder retains all rights, with a few specific
exceptions as stated below. Shareware authors are accomplished
programmers, just like commercial authors, and the programs are of
comparable quality. (In both cases, there are good programs and bad
ones!) The main difference is in the method of distribution. The
author specifically grants the right to copy and distribute the
software, either to all and sundry or to a specific group. For
example, some authors require written permission before a
commercial disk vendor may copy their Shareware.
Shareware is a distribution method, not a type of software. You
should find software that suits your needs and pocketbook, whether
it's commercial or Shareware. The Shareware system makes fitting
your needs easier, because you can try before you buy. And because
the overhead is low, prices are low also. Shareware has the
ultimate money-back guarantee -- if you don't use the product, you
don't pay for it.
"This program is produced by a member of the Association of
Shareware Professionals (ASP). ASP wants to make sure that the
shareware principle works for you. If you are unable to resolve a
shareware-related problem with an ASP member by contacting the
member directly, ASP may be able to help. The ASP Ombudsmen can
help you resolve a dispute or problem with the an ASP member, but
does not provide technical support for members' products. Please
write to the ASP Ombudsman at 545 Grover Road, Muskegon, MI 49442
or send a CompuServe message via CompuServe Mail to ASP Ombudsman
70007,3536."
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(C) 1992, P.K. Winter, Toronto, Ont. 3
[3] DISCLAIMER AND AGREEMENT
MQBE program and associated documentation, on hardcopy and on
magnetic media, is copyrighted and the author, P.K. Winter,
reserves all rights. MQBE software and associated documentation
are provided without warranty of any kind, either expressed or
implied. The author specifically disclaims any implied warranties
of merchantability or fitness of the software and documentation for
any particular purpose. In no event will the author be liable for
any damages, including any lost profits, lost savings, or other
incidental or consequential damages arising out of the use or the
inability to use this software. The author reserves the right to
make any changes in the software and in this documentation at any
time without obligation to notify anyone of such changes.
MQBE is a "shareware program" and is provided at no charge to the
user for evaluation. Feel free to share it with friends, but
please do not give it away altered or as part of another system.
The essence of "user-supported" software is to provide personal
computer users with quality software without high prices, and yet
to provide incentive for programmers to continue to develop new
products. If you find this program useful, entertaining, or
educational and continue to use MQBE after a reasonable trial
period, please submit a registration fee of $8.00 to the author.
Commercial or institutional users of MQBE must register and pay for
their copies of MQBE within 30 days of first use. The Site-License
fee for educational institutions is $15.00. For any other Site-
License arrangement, please contact the author at the address given
below.
Anyone distributing MQBE for any kind of remuneration must first
contact the author at the address below for authorization. This
authorization will be automatically granted to distributors
recognized by the Association of Shareware Professionals (ASP) as
adhering to its guidelines for shareware distributors, and such
distributors may begin offering MQBE immediately, however the
author must be advised so that the distributor can be kept up-to-
date with the latest version of MQBE.
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(C) 1992, P.K. Winter, Toronto, Ont. 4
You are encouraged to pass a copy of MQBE to your friends for
evaluation. Please encourage them to register their copy if they
find that they can use it. All registered users will receive a
copy of the latest, "registered" version of MQBE with
notification of updates.
Please submit your registration fee, questions, or comments to:
P. K. Winter
69 Summerhill Ave.
Toronto, Ont., M4T 1A9
CompuServe 71213,1337
[4] FILES
Version 1.1 of MQBE is distributed with the following
MQBE11.EXE the executable program
MQBE11.DOC this documentation file
READ.EXE utility for browsing ASCII text files:
READ filename
If you wish to share MQBE by any means - on diskettes or through
BBSs or in ZIP compressed form - please do not alter any of the
above files and keep all listed files together. Don't share
registered copies.
[5] REQUIREMENTS
To run MQBE you will need a 386SX or 486 based PS/2 or PC
compatible micro computer with a VGA color graphics adaptor and a
mouse.
MQBE was written in Turbo Pascal (V6.0) under DOS 5.0 on a 486
machine. It requires a VGA Multifrequency display that supports
display mode Hex'12' (16 color, 640x480 resolution). MQBE V1.1
uses a Timer ISR. The 'old' timer interrupt is restored on exit
from MQBE.
MQBE appears to run without problems under Windows 3.0 and Windows
3.1 but Windows is not my target environment and thus there are no
guarantees ... There is a definite performance advantage in using
a true 486 machine with the math co-processor.
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(C) 1992, P.K. Winter, Toronto, Ont. 5
[6] PLAYING MQBE
As indicated in Section [5], you need a VGA color monitor and a
mouse in order to play MQBE.
CONTROLS
The command bar at the top of the display screen provides five
gray-shaded control buttons. With the mouse, move the arrow-shaped
cursor onto the desired control button and click with either the
left or right mouse button to activate the control.
The available controls are:
QUIT ends the program and returns you to
the DOS prompt
RESET resets the magic cube to solid colors
on all six surfaces, the START position
of the cube
UNDO allows you to reverse the previous
move; you may continue to reverse
moves until you reach either the
START position or the original
SCRAMBLE position; in either case
you can continue to undo moves until
the counter reaches zero
SOUND toggles the sound ON and OFF
SCRAMBLE does a random number of rotations on
the cube, thus creating random
patterns on the surfaces of the
cube
To rotate any one of the six faces of the cube, click on any one of
the center squares in the 3-D representations of the cube.
A click with the LEFT button rotates the selected surface of the
cube COUNTERCLOCKWISE. A click with the RIGHT button rotates the
selected surface CLOCKWISE.
The rotation is always relative to the central square on the
surface selected as you were facing that surface.
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(C) 1992, P.K. Winter, Toronto, Ont. 6
GAMES PEOPLE PLAY
The most obvious challenge of MQBE is to have the cube scrambled
and then see how many moves (rotations) or how much time it takes
to reset the cube. Another form of amusement is to create pretty
patterns.
Since the invention of the Magic Cube, mathematicians have been
intrigued with such questions as
"Given a scrambled position, what is the minimum number
of moves required to restore the cube to the Start
position?"
and
"What are the best subgroups of rotations to achieve a
certain pattern?"
Teachers of group theory find the Magic Cube valuable for
demonstrating ideas such as non-commutativity, commutator
subgroups, transitivity, etc.
[7] NOTES ON THE MAGIC CUBE
Professor E. Rubik is a sculptor, architect and designer at the
School of Commercial Artists in Budapest, Hungary. The idea of the
magic cube first occurred to him in 1974. While many people had
serious doubts that it was possible to construct and manufacture
the type of mechanism required by the magic cube, Rubik filed a
patent application in 1975. The first commercial production of
Rubik's Cube (TM) reached the streets of Budapest in 1977. In one
of Rubik's articles, published in June, 1979, he jokingly predicted
that the magic cube would become a global fad. Without advertising
or publicity campaigns, Rubik sold 1 million cubes in 1980 in
Hungary, where the population is less than 10 million people. By
1981 Rubik's prediction of a global fad was more than fulfilled as
the production and distribution of the Magic Cube, now produced in
the Far East, simply exploded.
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(C) 1992, P.K. Winter, Toronto, Ont. 7
The Magic Cube won recognition and awards everywhere:
- Toy of the year in 1980 (England)
- Rubik's Cube (TM) - a new entry in the Oxford
English Dictionary
- on display in the Museum of Modern Art in New York
- cover article by Douglas Hofstadter in Scientific
American (May, 1981)
It's almost impossible to estimate how many Magic Cubes were sold
globally. But, alas, in 1992 it's no longer easy to find the cube
in stores. It has retreated to its roots: the world of academics,
mathematicians, physicists, nerds, and eccentric puzzle collectors.
What remains perplexing about the Magic Cube is its enormous
popular appeal in the early 80s when so few people could actually
solve the puzzle.
In Rubik's book, "A B�v�s Kocka" (Budapest, 1981), David
Singmaster's introduction offers the following explanation of the
Magic Cube's appeal:
- the cube's pieces remain joined during rotations
- with a single rotation several components are relocated
- elements of the cube can assume various orientations in the
same position
- it is a 3-D puzzle
- it is a cube(!)
- the cube is aesthetically pleasing
- the invisible mechanism of the cube is intriguing
- the cube's universe reveals mind-boggling complexity of
transformations and a staggering number of possible patterns
- academics, especially in the field of group theory and
combinatorics, see mathematical beauty in the cube
- educators see pedagogical value in the cube
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(C) 1992, P.K. Winter, Toronto, Ont. 8
The Magic Cube is a difficult puzzle. At one stage Rubik was
flooded with mail from fans wanting hints or "the solution". Rubik
admits with delightful charm and candor that from the outset he had
a heck of a time resetting the cube and that he was never able to
work out a general solution. Others have done so; see the
Bibliography for references. Educators and psychologists have
wondered for some time what unusual attribute of the mind allows
some pre-teen children to re-set the cube in a few minutes. How
does a twelve year old child, after a quick inspection of the
scrambled cube, reset the cube while blindfolded? In one case
(see Rubik's book) the twelve-year-old said "my fingers remember
what to do". A concert pianist might find this a perfectly natural
explanation.
With the obvious physical and tactile appeal of the Magic Cube and
with its intriguing mechanism, why would anyone want a computer
version of the Cube?
Early in 1992 a mathematician friend of mine observed that he was
interested in but was unable to find a Magic Cube program on the
major BBSs or in computer stores. I decided to fill the void and
write this program for fun. The program was first released in
April, 1992 under the name TheCube (V1.0). Shortly after that
release, I received a number of calls from Cube enthusiasts and
puzzle lovers to the effect that they were delighted with TheCube
program because they had been unable to find a 3-D, color version
of the Magic Cube. Clearly, playing with the physical Magic Cube
is a very different experience from using MQBE. What are the
possible compensations for using the software version of this
puzzle? Here are some
- the cube can be reset instantaneously - an impossibility with
the physical object
- an almost unlimited number of moves can be reversed
- there is a timer and move counter
- there is a 2-D, spread-out version of the cube which provides
additional visual information about each rotation
- the 3-D version on the screen allows one to view all six sides
simultaneously without risk of losing the orientation
- the software version of the Magic Cube makes experimentation
more convenient
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(C) 1992, P.K. Winter, Toronto, Ont. 9
Over the last decade many puzzles, card games, board games,
strategy games and games of luck have been ported to the PC.
Educators and people interested in various media may come to study
how the computer games are different and how the reactions,
exploring behavior, and strategies of players are modified when
playing the computer version of a game. Computer games may
represent a clear enrichment of the original idea. Conversely, a
programmed version of a game may not be an enrichment of the
original game but, because of the new medium and powerful controls,
may be a basically different game. As computers become more and
more important in the information age, and as they become
commodities that blend into our cultural fabric, computer games
will be exploited and explored systematically as a rich ground of
information for parents, educators, psychologists and media experts
of all philosophical stripes. MQBE is a modest contribution to
this end.
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(C) 1992, P.K. Winter, Toronto, Ont. 10
[8] BIBLIOGRAPHY
A B�v�s Kocka,
E. Rubik, Budapest, 1981
A race to conquer the Cube
N. Bauer, The Boston Globe, Jul 26 1981
Der W�rfel "Rubiks Cube"
J. Trajber, Falken Verlag, 1981
Hungarian Cube puzzle has cornered the market
W.J. Mitchell, The Detroit Free Press, Mar 15 1981
Mastering Rubik's Cube,
D. Taylor, Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1980
Quixotic quest - Cubed
L. Penix, The Cincinnati Post, Mar 13 1981
Rubik's Cube city's latest rage
T. Blackman, The Gazette, Montreal, Dec 4 1980
Rubik's Cube: Madness for Millions
F. Warshofsky, Reader's Digest, May 1981
Strategie zur L�sung
K. Endl, W�rfel Verlag GmbH, 1980
The Craze for Cubes
B. Sicock, The Sunday Times, Mar 15 1981
The Magic Cube's cubies ...,
D.R. Hofstadter, Scientific American, May 1981
The Secret of Rubik's Cube
G. Tucker, The Light - San Antonio, Feb 25 1981
The Simple Solution to Rubik's Cube
J.G. Nourse, Bantam Books, 1981
Trying to Solve Rubik's Cube
M. Muro, The Boston Globe, Jul 25 1981
Turn for the Worse: Simple Little Puzzle Drives Millions Mad
G. Bronson, The Wall Street Journal, Mar 5 1981
You Can Do The Cube,
P. Bossert, Penguin Books, 1981
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(C) 1992, P.K. Winter, Toronto, Ont. 11
[9] MAINTENANCE LOG
V1.0 (Apr/92) First released to CRS BBS and PCanada BBS
under the name TheCube.ZIP
V1.1 (Oct/92) First release as Shareware under the name
MQBE11.ZIP
- improved the speed of the SCRAMBLE routine
- added a clock ISR
- displays Unregistered Copy on message line; this
is the only difference between registered and
unregistered versions of MQBE11
Please send your registration fee of $8.00, questions, comments,
and suggestions to
P. K. Winter
69 Summerhill Ave.
Toronto, Ont., M4T 1A9
CompuServe 71213,1337
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(C) 1992, P.K. Winter, Toronto, Ont. 12
