Cube Lesson 1: Pieces, One Turn and Its Undo
First: what counts as winning?
There is no opponent. The goal is a solved cube: all six faces each have one colour and every piece matches the adjacent centres in position and orientation. Solving one face is not solving the cube.
A white face with mixed side colours is only partial progress. The first turning exercise simply asks you to return to its solved starting state.
Each exercise has a limited goal; playing an algorithm does not solve every scramble.
Learn the goal, three piece types and viewing versus turning, then undo a right turn and two top half-turns. Complete notation follows next.
Try it: turns and inverses
Keep the view steady and select an answer, then press Next step for one layer turn. Dragging changes only the view. Wrong answers do not silently complete a move.
Start solved. R turns the right face clockwise one quarter-turn. Press R.
R: looking straight at the right face, turn clockwise 90°.
A 3×3 cube has six faces, each showing nine stickers. The goal is one colour per face with every physical piece in its proper place. Making a white face alone does not necessarily solve the first layer: the side colours around it must also match their centres.
There are no alternating turns. Your first goals are to identify parts, turn one layer and reverse it—not memorise seven sequences immediately. An algorithm is simply a written sequence of turns, not an arithmetic formula.
The six centres each show one colour. Twelve edges show two colours each; eight corners show three. Stickers move together with their physical piece, not independently. Centres remain fixed relative to each other and identify each face's final colour.
A white-green edge belongs between the white and green centres. A white-green-red corner belongs where those three faces meet. Solved means both the correct location and orientation; a flipped piece in the right slot is still unsolved.
Dragging empty background changes the view, not the arrangement. Turning a layer changes the arrangement. Start white center up and green front. Keep the view steady and use single-step buttons first.
First learn R and R′: a clockwise quarter-turn viewed directly at the right face, and its inverse quarter-turn. The whole layer moves, not one sticker. The complete six-face notation follows in the next course.
The guided exercise compares a second undo: U2 turns the top half a revolution. Two top half-turns make a full revolution and return to the start. Observe R, R′, U2, U2; the next lesson extends these rules to every face.
Select this section and use Next move. R turns only the right layer 90°. Follow the front-upper-right corner as it moves with the edges on that layer; the left layer stays still.
R prime reverses the turn. The cube should return to its solved start. Use Back one to compare. Clockwise is judged looking directly at the right face, not at the front of the screen.
Algorithm
R R'
Point to a center, edge and corner, then perform R and R′ and check all six faces return to the start. Next open Basic Cube Notation for face letters, primes, half-turns and order instead of jumping into long algorithms.
The main route is Lesson 1 → Basic Notation → Layer-by-Layer Solving. After a complete solve, optionally study the two CFOP courses. Five Beautiful Patterns is a separate branch available after notation, not a required solving stage.