Half a croissant, on a plate, with a sign in front of it saying '50c'
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Vague satnav destination

Satnav takes you to a destination that is vague
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Satnav works very well. Put in a precise address e.g. Sonehenge, or Gunter's Fish Shop, Grimsby, or the Magic Roundabout, Swindon, and the device gives you a precise series of directions to arrive there, from wherever you are.

But suppose you are in a precise place, and have a "wherever" destination? The machine will kind of do the initial stages of this - if you enter "coffee shop" it will show you a selection of different ones on the map. But to start the navigation process you have to discard all but one options.

Proposed is a protocol to define a generic class or spread of potential destinations, and the machine directs you to the nearest or the bet according to pre-defined criteria. If you take a wrong turning, or if there is a crash and a tailback, the machine doesn't re-route you to the same initially chosen destination but silently calculates the shortest or quickest rout to the current nearest or best.

For example, I want to go to the coast. I enter "the coast" and the machine starts running, taking me to the nearest coast. Or I enter "international border crossing post" and it doesn't ask me which one I want, it just takes me to the nearest.

pocmloc, Sep 24 2022

[link]






       "I want to wake up at the coast"?   

       Sleepwalk satnav?
pertinax, Sep 24 2022
  

       Technically a city does not sleep because it isn't alive or awake. Individual organisms within it may be asleep or awake at different times; it is likely that most human habitations include nocturnal beings from cats down to bedbugs and so they (meaning their inhabitants) don't sleep. The song might be more accurately re-phrased "I want to wake up in a city, a significant proportion of whose human inhabitants are awake at any arbitrarily chosen time of the day or night". A few extra bars of music could easily enough be composed to fit these extended lyrics.
pocmloc, Sep 24 2022
  

       Edit: there is an implication that they are not only awake, but active. Perhaps even economically active. Add that qualification in.
pocmloc, Sep 24 2022
  

       Only just seen the category error, fixed now. Not sure how that happened. At least it wasn't a few higher on the list.
pocmloc, Sep 24 2022
  

       Ding! We're here! Time elapsed 0:00.
whatrock, Sep 24 2022
  
      
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