The methods listed as optimized in Table 5-5 are a diverse group and some have little in common except the goal of finding a linkage that will generate a desired path. All allow a theoretically unlimited number of design points to be specified, but making Ntoo large will increase the computation time and may not improve the result. One inherent limita tion of optimization methods is that they may converge to a local minimum near the start ing conditions. The result may not be as good as other minima located elsewhere in the N-space of the variables. Finding the global optimum is possible but more difficult and time consuming