A programming language is a system of notation for describing computations. A useful programming language must therefore be suited for both description (i.e., for human writers and readers of programs) and for computation (i.e., for efficient implementation on computers). But human beings and computers are so different that it is difficult to find notational devices that are well suited to the capabilities of both.
- R. Tennant
(Author)
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Path Finding: A* and Best-First Search
I just finished my A* implementation. I found it surprisingly amazing how similar A* is to best-first search (BFS). In a nutshell, A* is BFS with addition of the cost and F values. The main differences is that you must calculate your cost, and sum the cost the the heuristic value (your F score) and then sort your open list by F score instead of just the heuristic (as in BFS).
In the demo screen shots below, you will see two paths traced from the start (the green block) and stop (the red block) points. The cyan path is BFS and the yellow path is A*. For both paths, the successors were chosen from 4 directions.
Feel free to play with the demo here.
