Just to help sell it some more: autojump basically watches where you cd and builds a model (of some sort) that guesses where you want to go based on a few characters.

For instance, I have a project called "structured-prediction" deep in some folder hierarchy, and I can just type "j stru" or "j pred" or even "j uct" and it goes to the directory.

The best part is that it figures this out automatically. You don't have to remember to bookmark anything.

Agreed, autojump seems far more principled too than the method described in OP.

Autojump is my vote as well

I also prefer autojump.