Route planning is about finding paths form one location to another usually restructed to particular kinds of connection (such as roads or railways) and often with some form of optimisation criterion (such as minimal fuel costs) and constraints (such as passing particular intermediate points, or avoiding narrow roads). If all of the distances, links and locatiosn are known then various forms of graph search can be used, notably the A* algorithm. Where some parts are not known in advance there may need to be some form of high-level global planning to determine a best-guess approxiomate route, with local planning if problems are encountered, such as.a blocked road.
Defined on page 342
Used on pages 342, 344