A* Search Algorithm
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Motivation
To approximate the shortest path in real-life situations, like- in maps, games where
there can be many hindrances.
We can consider a 2D Grid having several obstacles and we start from a source cell
(colored red below) to reach towards a goal cell (colored green below)
What is A* Search Algorithm?
A* Search algorithm is one of the best and popular technique used in path-finding
and graph traversals.
Why A* Search Algorithm?
Informally speaking, A* Search algorithms, unlike other traversal techniques, it has
“brains”. What it means is that it is really a smart algorithm which separates it from
the other conventional algorithms. This fact is cleared in detail in below sections.
And it is also worth mentioning that many games and web-based maps use this
algorithm to find the shortest path very efficiently (approximation).
Pause
Explanation
Consider a square grid having many obstacles and we are given a starting cell and a
target cell. We want to reach the target cell (if possible) from the starting cell as
quickly as possible. Here A* Search Algorithm comes to the rescue.
What A* Search Algorithm does is that at each step it picks the node according to a
value-‘f’ which is a parameter equal to the sum of two other parameters – ‘g’ and ‘h’.
At each step it picks the node/cell having the lowest ‘f’, and process that node/cell.
We define ‘g’ and ‘h’ as simply as possible below
g = the movement cost to move from the starting point to a given square on the grid,
following the path generated to get there.
h = the estimated movement cost to move from that given square on the grid to the
final destination. This is often referred to as the heuristic, which is nothing but a
kind of smart guess. We really don’t know the actual distance until we find the path,
because all sorts of things can be in the way (walls, water, etc.). There can be many
ways to calculate this ‘h’ which are discussed in the later sections.
Algorithm
We create two lists – Open List and Closed List (just like Dijkstra Algorithm)
// A* Search Algorithm
1. Initialize the open list
2. Initialize the closed list
put the starting node on the open
list (you can leave its f at zero)
3. while the open list is not empty
a) find the node with the least f on
the open list, call it "q"
b) pop q off the open list
c) generate q's 8 successors and set their
parents to q
d) for each successor
i) if successor is the goal, stop search
ii) else, compute both g and h for successor
successor.g = q.g + distance between
successor and q
successor.h = distance from goal to
successor (This can be done using many
ways, we will discuss three heuristics-
Manhattan, Diagonal and Euclidean
Heuristics)
successor.f = successor.g + successor.h
iii) if a node with the same position as
successor is in the OPEN list which has a
lower f than successor, skip this successor
iV) if a node with the same position as
successor is in the CLOSED list which has
a lower f than successor, skip this successor
otherwise, add the node to the open list
end (for loop)
e) push q on the closed list
end (while loop)
So suppose as in the below figure if we want to reach the target cell from the source
cell, then the A* Search algorithm would follow path as shown below. Note that the
below figure is made by considering Euclidean Distance as a heuristics.
Heuristics
We can calculate g but how to calculate h ?
We can do things.
A) Either calculate the exact value of h (which is certainly time consuming).
OR
B ) Approximate the value of h using some heuristics (less time consuming).
We will discuss both of the methods.
A) Exact Heuristics –
We can find exact values of h, but that is generally very time consuming.
Below are some of the methods to calculate the exact value of h.
1) Pre-compute the distance between each pair of cells before running the A* Search
Algorithm.
2) If there are no blocked cells/obstacles then we can just find the exact value of h
without any pre-computation using the distance formula/Euclidean Distance
B) Approximation Heuristics –
There are generally three approximation heuristics to calculate h –
1) Manhattan Distance –
• It is nothing but the sum of absolute values of differences in the goal’s x
and y coordinates and the current cell’s x and y coordinates respectively,
i.e.,
h = abs (current_cell.x – goal.x) +
abs (current_cell.y – goal.y)
• When to use this heuristic? – When we are allowed to move only in four
directions only (right, left, top, bottom)
The Manhattan Distance Heuristics is shown by the below figure (assume red spot
as source cell and green spot as target cell).
2) Diagonal Distance-
• It is nothing but the maximum of absolute values of differences in the
goal’s x and y coordinates and the current cell’s x and y coordinates
respectively, i.e.,
dx = abs(current_cell.x – goal.x)
dy = abs(current_cell.y – goal.y)
h = D * (dx + dy) + (D2 - 2 * D) * min(dx, dy)
where D is length of each node(usually = 1) and D2 is diagonal
distance between each node (usually = sqrt(2) ).
• When to use this heuristic? – When we are allowed to move in eight
directions only (similar to a move of a King in Chess)
The Diagonal Distance Heuristics is shown by the below figure (assume red spot as
source cell and green spot as target cell).
3) Euclidean Distance-
• As it is clear from its name, it is nothing but the distance between the
current cell and the goal cell using the distance formula
h = sqrt ( (current_cell.x – goal.x)2 +
(current_cell.y – goal.y)2 )
• When to use this heuristic? – When we are allowed to move in any
directions.
The Euclidean Distance Heuristics is shown by the below figure (assume red spot as
source cell and green spot as target cell).
Relation (Similarity and Differences) with other algorithms-
Dijkstra is a special case of A* Search Algorithm, where h = 0 for all nodes.
