how complicated is this idea?

filn

on a scale of 1 to 10 (one being never seen php before and 10 being the greatest coder of all time) my php skill is around a 3. do you think i could make this script idea or is it too complicated for somebody with my limited skill. here is the problem, i want to make a script that i can input an unit of area (square feet), and then i want it to output a bunch of polygons that would contain that area (with measurements of the sides). how hard would it be to make something like this?

Drakla

If you've got any criteria for the polygons then it could be hard, otherwise it's potentially stupidly easy. Is your starting area a square, oblong, triangle, random shape which you supply the vertices for?

Would you be picking random points within the object, then using that as a vertex, using the existing points as other vertices, then making polygons from combinations of those vertices?

Weedpacket

On a scale of 1 to 10, how do you rate your mathematical ability? Do you, for example, know how to measure the area of an arbitrary polygon?

Arc

Any kind of math you need can easily be looked up on the internet. The drawing the polygons will be the hard part. If yer just spitting out numbers that's one thing, but if you are having to use all the code that actualy draws the objects then that can be quite complicated.

Weedpacket

[man]imageline[/man].
Didn't hurt a bit.

deezzer

Hey Weedpacket and Drakla, i notice you guys are ones really trying to help a lot of the posters on this board, and i think that's really awesome.

Some people are rich with money, you guys are rich with care, so thanks for caring.

filn

my math skills are decent, its the php that needs the work. they dont have to be incredibly complicated polygons. maybe i could limit the number of sides or something to keep it simple. or maybe it doesnt need to actually draw them, but just tell me how many sides it has and the length of each side.

Weedpacket

Still too vague; for any given area there are already an infinite number of rectangles with that area.

bradgrafelman

How about we limit the function to regular polygons only? evil laugh

But more seriously.. I had an idea, but apparently you need to know angle measures as well. This link has an involved description of what we're trying to do here. 🙁

EDIT: Again, here's a formula that relies on points, not line lengths...

Two dimensions: Polygons
The area of a polygon whose vertices are P1, P2, .., Pn is given by the expression

K = [(x1y2 + x2y3 + x3y4 + ... + xny1) - (x2y1 + x3y2 + x4y3 + ... + x1yn)]/2.