Salesman

Description

This game is a version of the classic "Traveling Salesman" problem that has fascinated mathematicians for centuries. The basic problem is to find the shortest route that connects a series of locations and returns to the starting point. There is no known mathematical method of finding the best answer, other than the brute force approach of simply trying all possible combinations.

The number of routes goes up very quickly as the number of points increases. For the nine-point problem used in the puzzle, there are 40320 possible routes that touch every dot once and return to the beginning. In general, for a problem with N points, the number of different routes is factorial(N-1).

Fortunately, humans are pretty good at this sort of thing. Most people can solve such a puzzle after only a few attempts. Try your luck!