Computing the Diameter of a Point Set

Given a finite set of points [Formula: see text] in ℝ d , the diameter of [Formula: see text] is defined as the maximum distance between two points of [Formula: see text]. We propose a very simple algorithm to compute the diameter of a finite set of points. Although the algorithm is not worst-case optimal, an extensive experimental study has shown that it is extremely fast for a large variety of point distributions. In addition, we propose a comparison with the recent approach of Har-Peled 5 and derive hybrid algorithms to combine advantages of both approaches.