While planning routes for my family while skiing in Vail, I thought it would be cool to create an application that can automatically do this. My end goal was to be able to select a starting and ending point, and the program would tell you the shortest path between the two.
This project uses graph traversal and Dijkstra's Algorithm (https://brilliant.org/wiki/dijkstras-short-path-finder/) in order to find the shorest path. Every ski map is represented as a graph of verticies, all connected by edges. I have written a tool with Pygame that helps me easily create maps for different ski resorts.
Eventually, I'd like to turn this project into a full-fledged app that someone could use for themselves while skiing.
I have decided to put this project on hold for now to start working on my long list of other projects, but I have ideas for a variety of different features that could possibly be implemented in the future.
Here are some of them:
- Generate paths bised around different parameters (avoid all lifts, avoid certain trail difficulties)
- Access an API that will remove certain lifts and trails from the map depending on if they are open or closed for the day
- Change the weights of each edge to reflect the average speed travelled on a trail, instead of the total distance
- Add multiple stops on a path, requiring certain nodes to be traversed through
Basic graph used for testing Dijkstra's Algorithm
The first map created with the map editor
Final application