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.IX Title "PLANIMETER 1"
.TH PLANIMETER 1 2025-09-30 "GeographicLib 2.6" "GeographicLib Utilities"
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.nh
.SH NAME
Planimeter \-\- compute the area of geodesic polygons
.SH SYNOPSIS
.IX Header "SYNOPSIS"
\&\fBPlanimeter\fR [ \fB\-r\fR ] [ \fB\-s\fR ] [ \fB\-l\fR ] [ \fB\-e\fR \fIa\fR \fIf\fR ]
[ \fB\-w\fR ] [ \fB\-p\fR \fIprec\fR ] [ \fB\-G\fR | \fB\-Q\fR | \fB\-R\fR ] [ \fB\-E\fR ]
[ \fB\-\-geoconvert\-input\fR ]
[ \fB\-\-comment\-delimiter\fR \fIcommentdelim\fR ]
[ \fB\-\-version\fR | \fB\-h\fR | \fB\-\-help\fR ]
[ \fB\-\-input\-file\fR \fIinfile\fR | \fB\-\-input\-string\fR \fIinstring\fR ]
[ \fB\-\-line\-separator\fR \fIlinesep\fR ]
[ \fB\-\-output\-file\fR \fIoutfile\fR ]
.SH DESCRIPTION
.IX Header "DESCRIPTION"
Measure the area of a geodesic polygon.  Reads polygon vertices from
standard input, one per line.  Vertices are be given as latitude and
longitude.  By default latitude precedes longitude, however this
convention is reversed with the \fB\-w\fR flag and a hemisphere designator
(\fIN\fR, \fIS\fR, \fIE\fR, \fIW\fR) can be used to disambiguate the coordinates.
The end of input, a blank line, or a line which can\*(Aqt be interpreted
as a vertex signals the end of one polygon and the start of the next.
For each polygon print a summary line with the number of points, the
perimeter (in meters), and the area (in meters^2).
.PP
The edges of the polygon are given by the \fIshortest\fR geodesic (or
rhumb line) between consecutive vertices.  In certain cases, there may
be two or many such shortest path, and in that case, the polygon is
not uniquely specified by its vertices.  For geodesics, this only
happens with very long edges (for the WGS84 ellipsoid, any edge
shorter than 19970 km is uniquely specified by its end points).  In
such cases, insert an additional vertex near the middle of the long
edge to define the boundary of the polygon.
.PP
By default, polygons traversed in a counter\-clockwise direction return a
positive area and those traversed in a clockwise direction return a
negative area.  This sign convention is reversed if the \fB\-r\fR option is
given.
.PP
Of course, encircling an area in the clockwise direction is equivalent
to encircling the rest of the ellipsoid in the counter\-clockwise
direction.  The default interpretation used by \fBPlanimeter\fR is the one
that results in a smaller magnitude of area; i.e., the magnitude of the
area is less than or equal to one half the total area of the ellipsoid.
If the \fB\-s\fR option is given, then the interpretation used is the one
that results in a positive area; i.e., the area is positive and less
than the total area of the ellipsoid.
.PP
Arbitrarily complex polygons are allowed.  In the case of
self\-intersecting polygons the area is accumulated "algebraically",
e.g., the areas of the 2 loops in a figure\-8 polygon will partially
cancel.  Polygons may include one or both poles.  There is no need to
close the polygon.
.SH OPTIONS
.IX Header "OPTIONS"
.IP \fB\-r\fR 4
.IX Item "-r"
toggle whether counter\-clockwise traversal of the polygon returns a
positive (the default) or negative result.
.IP \fB\-s\fR 4
.IX Item "-s"
toggle whether to return a signed result (the default) or not.
.IP \fB\-l\fR 4
.IX Item "-l"
toggle whether the vertices represent a polygon (the default) or a
polyline.  For a polyline, the number of points and the length of the
path joining them is returned; the path is not closed and the area is
not reported.
.IP "\fB\-e\fR \fIa\fR \fIf\fR" 4
.IX Item "-e a f"
specify the ellipsoid via the equatorial radius, \fIa\fR and
the flattening, \fIf\fR.  Setting \fIf\fR = 0 results in a sphere.  Specify
\&\fIf\fR < 0 for a prolate ellipsoid.  A simple fraction, e.g., 1/297,
is allowed for \fIf\fR.  By default, the WGS84 ellipsoid is used, \fIa\fR =
6378137 m, \fIf\fR = 1/298.257223563.  If entering vertices as UTM/UPS or
MGRS coordinates, use the default ellipsoid, since the conversion of
these coordinates to latitude and longitude always uses the WGS84
parameters.
.IP \fB\-w\fR 4
.IX Item "-w"
toggle the longitude first flag (it starts off); if the flag is on, then
when reading geographic coordinates, longitude precedes latitude (this
can be overridden by a hemisphere designator, \fIN\fR, \fIS\fR, \fIE\fR, \fIW\fR).
.IP "\fB\-p\fR \fIprec\fR" 4
.IX Item "-p prec"
set the output precision to \fIprec\fR (default 6); the perimeter is given
(in meters) with \fIprec\fR digits after the decimal point; the area is
given (in meters^2) with (\fIprec\fR \- 5) digits after the decimal point.
.IP \fB\-G\fR 4
.IX Item "-G"
the edges joining the vertices are geodesics.  This is the default
option and is recommended for terrestrial applications.  This option,
\&\fB\-G\fR, and the following two options, \fB\-Q\fR and \fB\-R\fR, are mutually
exclusive.
.IP \fB\-Q\fR 4
.IX Item "-Q"
map the points to the authalic sphere and compute the area of the
resulting spherical polygon.  The area will be reasonable accurate
\&\fIprovided\fR that the edges are sufficiently short.  The perimeter
calculation is not accurate.
.IP \fB\-R\fR 4
.IX Item "-R"
the edges joining the vertices are rhumb lines instead of geodesics.
.IP \fB\-E\fR 4
.IX Item "-E"
use the exact equations for the geodesic \fB\-G\fR, authalic \fB\-Q\fR, and
rhumb \fB\-R\fR calculations instead of series expansions.  For the
geodesic and rhumb methods, the area is computed by applying discrete
sine transforms to the integrand in the expression for the area.
These are more accurate, albeit slower, than the (default) series
expansions for |\fIf\fR| > 0.02 and will give high accuracy for \-99
< \fIf\fR < 0.99.  It is not necessary to specify this option for
terrestrial applications.
.IP \fB\-\-geoconvert\-input\fR 4
.IX Item "--geoconvert-input"
The input lines are interpreted in the same way as \fBGeoConvert\fR\|(1)
allowing the coordinates for the vertices to be given as UTM/UPS or
MGRS coordinates, as well as latitude and longitude.  \fBCAUTION\fR:
GeoConvert assumes the coordinates refer to the WGS84 ellipsoid
(disregarding the \fB\-e\fR flag) and MGRS coordinates signify the center
of the corresponding MGRS square.
.IP "\fB\-\-comment\-delimiter\fR \fIcommentdelim\fR" 4
.IX Item "--comment-delimiter commentdelim"
set the comment delimiter to \fIcommentdelim\fR (e.g., "#" or "//").  If
set, the input lines will be scanned for this delimiter and, if found,
the delimiter and the rest of the line will be removed prior to
processing.  For a given polygon, the last such string found will be
appended to the output line (separated by a space).
.IP \fB\-\-version\fR 4
.IX Item "--version"
print version and exit.
.IP \fB\-h\fR 4
.IX Item "-h"
print usage and exit.
.IP \fB\-\-help\fR 4
.IX Item "--help"
print full documentation and exit.
.IP "\fB\-\-input\-file\fR \fIinfile\fR" 4
.IX Item "--input-file infile"
read input from the file \fIinfile\fR instead of from standard input; a file
name of "\-" stands for standard input.
.IP "\fB\-\-input\-string\fR \fIinstring\fR" 4
.IX Item "--input-string instring"
read input from the string \fIinstring\fR instead of from standard input.
All occurrences of the line separator character (default is a semicolon)
in \fIinstring\fR are converted to newlines before the reading begins.
.IP "\fB\-\-line\-separator\fR \fIlinesep\fR" 4
.IX Item "--line-separator linesep"
set the line separator character to \fIlinesep\fR.  By default this is a
semicolon.
.IP "\fB\-\-output\-file\fR \fIoutfile\fR" 4
.IX Item "--output-file outfile"
write output to the file \fIoutfile\fR instead of to standard output; a
file name of "\-" stands for standard output.
.SH EXAMPLES
.IX Header "EXAMPLES"
Example (the area of the 100km MGRS square 18SWK)
.PP
.Vb 7
\&   Planimeter \-\-geoconvert\-input <<EOF
\&   18n 500000 4400000
\&   18n 600000 4400000
\&   18n 600000 4500000
\&   18n 500000 4500000
\&   EOF
\&   => 4 400139.532959 10007388597.2
.Ve
.PP
The following code takes the output from gdalinfo and reports the area
covered by the data (assuming the edges of the image are geodesics).
.PP
.Vb 10
\&   #! /bin/sh
\&   grep \-E \*(Aq^((Upper|Lower) (Left|Right)|Center) \*(Aq |
\&   sed \-e \*(Aqs/d /d/g\*(Aq \-e "s/\*(Aq /\*(Aq/g" | tr \-s \*(Aq(),\er\et\*(Aq \*(Aq \*(Aq | awk \*(Aq{
\&       if ($1 $2 == "UpperLeft")
\&           ul = $6 " " $5;
\&       else if ($1 $2 == "LowerLeft")
\&           ll = $6 " " $5;
\&       else if ($1 $2 == "UpperRight")
\&           ur = $6 " " $5;
\&       else if ($1 $2 == "LowerRight")
\&           lr = $6 " " $5;
\&       else if ($1 == "Center") {
\&           printf "%s\en%s\en%s\en%s\en\en", ul, ll, lr, ur;
\&           ul = ll = ur = lr = "";
\&       }
\&   }
\&   \*(Aq | Planimeter | cut \-f3 \-d\*(Aq \*(Aq
.Ve
.SH ACCURACY
.IX Header "ACCURACY"
Using the \fB\-G\fR option (the default), the accuracy was estimated by
computing the error in the area for 10^7 approximately regular
polygons on the WGS84 ellipsoid.  The centers and the orientations of
the polygons were uniformly distributed, the number of vertices was
log\-uniformly distributed in [3, 300], and the center to vertex
distance log\-uniformly distributed in [0.1 m, 9000 km].
.PP
The maximum error in the perimeter was 200 nm, and the maximum error
in the area was
.PP
.Vb 4
\&   0.0013 m^2 for perimeter < 10 km
\&   0.0070 m^2 for perimeter < 100 km
\&   0.070 m^2 for perimeter < 1000 km
\&   0.11 m^2 for all perimeters
.Ve
.SH "SEE ALSO"
.IX Header "SEE ALSO"
\&\fBGeoConvert\fR\|(1), \fBGeodSolve\fR\|(1).
.PP
An online version of this utility is availbable at
<https://geographiclib.sourceforge.io/cgi\-bin/Planimeter>.
.PP
The algorithm for the area of geodesic polygon is
given in Section 6 of C. F. F. Karney, \fIAlgorithms for geodesics\fR,
J. Geodesy 87, 43\-55 (2013);
DOI <https://doi.org/10.1007/s00190\-012\-0578\-z>;
addenda: <https://geographiclib.sourceforge.io/geod\-addenda.html>.
.PP
The algorithm for the area of a rhumb polygon is given in Section 3 of
C. F. F. Karney, \fIThe area of rhumb polygons\fR,
Stud. Geophys. Geod. 68(3\-\-4), 99\-\-120 (2024);
DOI <https://doi.org/10.1007/s11200\-024\-0709\-z>.
.SH AUTHOR
.IX Header "AUTHOR"
\&\fBPlanimeter\fR was written by Charles Karney.
.SH HISTORY
.IX Header "HISTORY"
\&\fBPlanimeter\fR was added to GeographicLib,
<https://geographiclib.sourceforge.io>, in version 1.4.