Help the n00b. What are appropriate general guidelines for what to do with your hands in given positions?

For example, If you are in someone's guard, do you want to keep your hands in close to your body? Keep them moving?

If you are in the guard (opponent on top), should you be moving and attacking?

And so on. Looking for ideas for various postions - when you are in the mount, the guard, in someone else's guard, etc. Any help would be appreciated.

The general answer is....

it depends.

As a new student, learn to keep your "base" and your butt low to the ground when on your knees. Getting locked, choked and swept is the best reminder to keep your arms in close but not so close that you can't use them to attack.

You can totally lock down your hands and arms while in your opponent's Guard and prevent him from attacking you. However, the game will quickly become stalled and get very boring. At some point, you have to engage and take an acceptable risk while moving your hands into a position to help you maneuver.

As a general rule, you should not extend your arms out to the point where you come out of balance. Experience is the best teacher to determine where that point is for you.

if u get mounted, keep your elbows in tight so your opponent wont climb in higher on your chest, this will also make it harder for your opponent to keylock/americana you.

if you take somebody's back, get one arm under his shoulder and one arm over his shoulder and lock or grab collar.

Underhooks are a good bet no matter where you are. And never let your elbows come away from your body.

Those 2 basic rules will keep you pretty safe

More specific:

Guard - If you have a underhook on one side he cannot pass on that side. Tight overhooks are nice too. But really, it is your legs doing more to control him from here so worry about them. Most beginners tend to stick to a closed guard, if that is the case start climbing up his back with your legs, they whould be what is holding him down.

Side mounted - The side on his hips, keep the elbow under him. If it goes up beside his hips he can attack it. The other side - either outside his arms with your elbow in, or applying pressure across his throat with your elbow in. Don't reach over his shoulder or straighten your arm.

In guard - Control his hips, head or biceps.

Mounted - Elbows have to stay in, If he gets his knee wedged into your armpit and brings your elbow up he can attack it. You can also stall a bit with a body lock and tucking your head up, but you should be looking to either elbow escape or overhook a arm tightly and bridge.

Anyways, commone themes are obviously elbows in and go for under/overhooks. Other things might come in later... ok, they will, but for now that should be it. Best to keep things to simple rules that apply almost anywhere then trying to look at very specific scenarios.