NearHop is a Hyderabad based startup, which hopes to provide you the best possible itinerary. Once you enter your trip details, NearHop will discover all possible routes to your destination, which includes travel via air, train and bus. So, for instance, if I am searching for a trip from Ahmedabad to Bangalore, the NearHop engine shows me that I can either travel by air or by a bus-train combination (take a bus from ahmedabad to pune and then take a train from pune to Bangalore or take a train from Ahmedabad to Mumabi and then a bus from Mumbai to Bangalore).
Each itinerary also lists the estimated price and also provides you the option to book the ticket. You can also filter the results by the number of hops you’re willing to take (3′s the maximum). I may need a refresher of my algorithms course, but I think this is an example of the classic Travelling Salesman Problem. And while the engine forms the core feature of the site, the algorithm does need some additional tuning.
