What does the star in the A* algorithm mean?
<p>I'm quite sure  the * <strong>(star)</strong> in the <strong>A* algorithm</strong> means that the algorithm is <strong>admissible</strong>, i.e. it is guaranteed that it finds the shortest path in the graph if this path exists (when the heuristic employed is optimistic). </p>

<p>Am I right? I was unsuccessfully looking for any info about the topic but I couldn't find any reference. Hopefully, most experienced users in this community know something else about the history of A* than I do. </p>

<p>By the way, I think that other algorithms like IDA*, D*, SMA*, MOA*, NAMOA*, ...  that are based on A* follow the same name convention.</p>