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From: dchapman@toc.torolab.ibm.com (Dale Chapman Tic)
Subject: Re: Shortest path in a matrix
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Date: Tue, 9 Aug 1994 12:57:26 GMT
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Jay,

I don't want to sound really sarcastic, but what you have asked for is 
the solution to the "shortest path in a graph" problem, which is known
to be NP complete (for a definition, see a text book on discrete mathematics
or graph theory). The long and the short of it is there is no known way to
locate the shortest path without checking all possible paths. If you can solve
this problem and prove it, I am sure that there is a university somewhere who
will give you a PhD. This problem has been around for quite a while.
Sorry that I can't help you beyond that.

Dale Chapman
dchapman@vnet.ibm.com

(standard disclaimers apply).


