Message #3611

From: Roice Nelson <roice3@gmail.com>
Subject: Re: [MC4D] Remembering Andrey Astrelin
Date: Fri, 13 Jan 2017 15:25:52 -0600

Thank you for letting the group know Nan. Andrey influenced me so much,
and this news is very sad. I will miss him.

I have many memories of Andrey, but thought I would share a few of my
favorites…

When he released MHT633, Andrey did not even tell us what it was - he let
us guess! That was a fun way to announce it, and I still recall the
excitement and joy investigating that amazing puzzle abstraction. The
surprises were wonderful. It introduced me to exotic hyperbolic honeycombs
for the first time, which have held my interest ever since, and he
subsequently shared many further insights about them with me. To date, his
MHT633 is still the coolest puzzle in my mind, abstracting so many
different features of the original Rubik’s cube. I like the way Andrey
would blow my mind by conjuring up something way beyond my current thinking.

I loved reading Andrey’s emails for all their insights. Often I would need
to read them a number of times. When he turned his attention to MagicTile,
he noticed all sorts of things I hadn’t considered. He pointed out how one
of the {8,3} 6C puzzles was combinatorially the Rubik’s cube in disguise.
He had thoughts on what colorings would work and helped me map out
identifications for the {8,3} 24C. He appreciated the beauty of certain
puzzles and encouraged their creation - for example, he requested the
hemi-Megaminx and knew it would be a special puzzle. He ended up digging
into the configuration files and building some of his own. He had a great
mind.

For those who were friends with Andrey on facebook, folks are leaving
messages on his page here
<https://www.facebook.com/astr0073/posts/1650043985296523>.

Roice

On Fri, Jan 13, 2017 at 10:24 AM, mananself@gmail.com [4D_Cubing] <
4D_Cubing@yahoogroups.com> wrote:

>
>
> I was so saddened to hear the tragic news that the member of our group,
> the creator of many high dimensional puzzles, lost his battle to cancer. It
> is a huge loss to his family and our little community.
>
> Andrey is the most creative, productive, talented, and passionate person I
> know in this group. Many of us played the puzzles he created and are
> inspired by them. Snippets from the MC4D website:
>
> "In 2010, Andrey Astrelin joined our community and immediately broke
> several of our most cherished records. Not satisfied, he then wrote and
> released his own seven dimensional version! MagicCube7D solves the problem
> of visualizing such a high-dimensional object by starting with our
> now-familiar 4D projection and then partially unrolling the last three
> dimensions using a clever fractal-like design. Not just one puzzle this
> amazing piece of code supports all 12 cubes from 34 through 57. Oh and then
> he went and solved the 37."
>
> "Magic Puzzle Ultimate also from Andrey is his version of MagicCube4D. The
> user interface is quite different and some experienced users prefer it. It
> includes some unique and special puzzles such as the much desired and very
> difficult 24-cell, the 48-cell, the 600-cell along with deep-cut truncated,
> runcinated, rectified, and snub versions of many of these plus some 5D and
> 6D puzzles."
>
> "Magic Hyperbolic Tile {6,3,3} from Andrey is the 3D version of Roice’s
> MagicTile because it lives in a hyperbolic 3-space. This puzzle turns out
> to be devilishly hard but also gloriously beautiful to behold."
>
> I enjoyed discussing geometry and puzzles with Andrey in this group. His
> great ideas and deep understandings enlightened us.
>
> Andrey loved puzzles so much. His family told me, that "he deals with
> puzzles till the last days."
>
> Let’s take a moment to remember Andrey. To me, Andrey moved to higher
> dimensions. I’m sending my deepest condolences to his family.
>
> Sincerely,
>
> Nan Ma
>
>
>
>
>
>