Via FlowingData, a fascinating visualiser that shows how algorithms find optimal routes in your mapping apps. I don’t know if the methods are at all representative of the apps that the dev cleverly declines to name, but it set my imagination off thinking about different ways of doing a task like this.

One of my favourite things to learn about is how things that feel extremely simple are unbelievably complicated once you look under the hood. I’ve already lost about an hour playing with this today. I can’t wait to show my kid this.