IIRC == If I Remember Correctly
As far as an example, I typically preferred to do coupling on a nodal basis, via CP, CPINT, or CPCYC commands.
CP is used when typically when you're manually joining together two groups of nodes that may not necessarily be coincident.
CPINT is used when you have two adjacent surfaces that you'd like to connect. Often times I would use these instead of contact regions. Contact regions make the problem nonlinear and increase solution time drastically. Aside from that, they are picky and can often ruin a solution if not defined well.
So, as an example, let's say that you're doing a 2D axisymmetric analysis of two tubes, one which fits inside the other. You could take the nodes at the interface and couple them via CPINT only in the UX direction (radial). This would allow the parts to slip both tangentially (if doing 3D) and axially.
CPCYC is cyclic coupling. I've typically used it when doing a 3D sector analysis. The other option is the CYCLIC command which like coupling commands, increases solution drastically. If you were doing a slice of a part, you would select the outer slice nodes, issue the CPCYC command in all directions (ensuring you were in the correct coordinate system).
All of the CP commands assume that you either have matched nodes, or at least close. There is typically a tolerance on the commands, but aside from that they assume matched nodes. In fact, if you increase the tolerance too much, you'll get nodes being coupled to more than 1 node on the adjacent side, and the solution will bomb.
CE commands are very similar except they operate on an elemental basis, meaning they doing require matched nodes. Because of this, however, I find that they don't quite work as well.