It is probably worth noting that the "Robot" doesn't "solve"
the puzzle. There is a computer driving the robot that
determines what moves to make. I believe the computer program
to tell you what faces to turn to solve the puzzle has existed
for a number of years.
The coup-de-grace of the Robot (and its designer) here is
that it is capable of exerting enough (but not too much) force
on the cube and having the dexterity to rotate the faces.
That and the willingingness of the designer to persevere in
continuous redesigns until he got it to work.
I'm pretty sure there was an extensive discussion of this
and some pointers to more articles on Slashdot.org a few
months ago.
Robert
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