Rubik's Snake
In 2006 Johannes Laire and I had many conversations about the Rubik's Snake puzzle, competing against each other and sharing shape ideas. We eventually created a notation that can be seen on the speedsolving.com wiki page. We also created our own two speedsolving ball shape solutions and became the top two fastest unofficial solvers.
How the notation works: The Rubik's Snake consists of 24 connected pieces, with each piece having the ability to rotate in 90 degree turns. From left to right the pieces are numberd from 1 to 24 and the numbers are listed in a sequence to show which piece is being turned. A clockwise turn adds a "+" to the number, counter-clockwise adds "-", and a double turn is "x". To make the notation even shorter, if there is a sequence of numbers in order with no missing numbers, the numbers themselves can be removed and only the symbols written, like + - + + -. Below is the speedsolving solution that I created for the ball shape. Johannes Laire had his own solution that was sort of the opposite order of mine.
2- 3- 4+ 6+ 7+ 5- 8- 9+ 11- 10- 12+ 14+ 15+ 13- 16- 17+ 19- 20+ 21- 18- 23+ 24- 22+