Algorithm for finding nearby points?

Question

Given a set of several million points with x,y coordinates, what is the algorithm of choice for quickly finding the top 1000 nearest points from a location? \"Quickly\" here mea

Answer 1

In addition to the QuadTree and BSP tree suggestions, you should look up nearest neighbour searching. The choice of algorithm is based on how often you are adding to your base dataset. If you are adding and removing often, tree solutions are superior. If the data is more static, nearest neighbour searching and voronoi diagrams can be much faster and scale better.