Taking a "Better" Route

It's not really learning.

This will come in to play more often on long routes than on short ones. When the unit calculates a route, it is performing a bunch of mathematical calculations in order to attempt to select a route that achieves the "fastest" or "shortest" selection along with your avoidances. There are many decision points where the unit is looking at whether to go this way or go that way.

At some point this decision process can get bogged down in minutiae. The route may gain a minute or two going this way instead of that way, but it has to stop choosing a some point and just be satisfied with the route that it has calculated. It does the best that it can but as you get closer to your destination, it can get a better sense of whether this way is "better" than that way. So you might get the "better route is available" prompt.

Interesting concept..

My wife had suggested the "learning" possibility on the basis of the device seeming to "realize" that the route we took was the better route vs. the one it proposed. Because, on the next journey it proposed "our" route. (I'm still wanting to verify that it made the above "relalization" automatically, and that this had nothing to do with a change to the fastest time or shortest distance settings. I short, I'm looking to see if this happens a second time..)

On a related note, I'm noticing that many new roads are not on the internal map. So if these devices can be programmed to "learn" then maybe someday the devices may automatically update the internal maps. I realize that this is not a big help because, this means one would have to make the drive to do the update. Also, I'm thinking that the map providers would instead like to sell me an updated map rather than have my device update automatically.

The concept of the large number of calculations and the update determination while in route is interesting. I'm anxious to see what happens when and if it occurs. Thanks a bunch MM for your response.