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Variations on ray shooting

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Abstract

We solve some problems related toray shooting in the plane, such as finding the first object hit by a query ray or counting the number of objects intersected by the query line. Our main results are an algorithm for finding the first hit when the objects are lines, and an algorithm for the case when the objects are segments. If the segments form simple polygons, this information can be used for reducing the complexity of the algorithms. The algorithms are efficient in space and in query time. Moreover, they are simple and therefore of practical use.

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Communicated by Nimrod Megiddo.

This research was partially supported by the NY Metropolitan Research Fund. The second author is currently at IBM Haifa Research Group, Haifa 32000, Israel.

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Bar-Yehuda, R., Fogel, S. Variations on ray shooting. Algorithmica 11, 133–145 (1994). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF01182772

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF01182772

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