RoutePlanner was a UK road navigation program written by ChaRleyTroniC, and sold commercially by Sentinel Software and Radical Software.
Using a database of the UK's motorways and A roads, RoutePlanner would generate the fastest or shortest route between any two places on request - as with the well-known PC program AutoRoute.
This route would be drawn on a scrollable map of the UK, or shown in a printable itinerary.
A standard A*/best-first algorithm was used to calculate the routes.
The first version was very slow to calculate the longest routes (taking up to half an hour for Land's End to John O'Groats).
A subsequent revision brought this time down to a couple of minutes.
The program required a 128k CPC.
Because of the size of the database, users were asked to choose an area of Britain to omit (Scotland, Wales, or the south-west) when loading the program.
RoutePlanner was reviewed favourably in Amstrad Action issue 108, but sales were very modest.
A (greatly improved) PCW version was subsequently developed and enjoyed more success, not least due to distribution by LocoScript Software.
Disc
- Router Planner
Side B
Side A
Manual
- Router Planner Manual (pdf)
Download
- Routeplanner (disc).zip (DSK for Emulators)