Source : Free On-Line Dictionary of Computing

wall follower
     
         A person or {algorithm} that compensates for lack
        of sophistication or native stupidity by efficiently following
        some simple procedure shown to have been effective in the
        past.  Used of an algorithm, this is not necessarily
        pejorative; it recalls "Harvey Wallbanger", the winning robot
        in an early AI contest (named, of course, after the cocktail).
        Harvey successfully solved mazes by keeping a "finger" on one
        wall and running till it came out the other end.  This was
        inelegant, but it was mathematically guaranteed to work on
        simply-connected mazes - and, in fact, Harvey outperformed
        more sophisticated robots that tried to "learn" each maze by
        building an internal representation of it.  Used of humans,
        the term *is* pejorative and implies an uncreative,
        bureaucratic, by-the-book mentality.
     
        See also {code grinder}.
     
        [{Jargon File}]
     
        (2003-02-03)