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From: dkukral@encad.Wichita.NCR.COM (Dean Kukral)
Newsgroups: comp.software-eng
Subject: Re: Surface Area
Summary: surface integral
Keywords: definition
Message-ID: <712@encad.Wichita.NCR.COM>
Date: 1 May 89 13:17:18 GMT
References: <7978@thorin.cs.unc.edu>
Organization: NCR, E&M Wichita - KS
Lines: 14

In article <7978@thorin.cs.unc.edu>, shan@unc.cs.unc.edu (Yen-Ping Shan) writes:
> 
> 	Can anyone give or point me to a precise definition of "Surface
> Area?"  Is there a system that allows me to compute the value of the
> surface area?
> 	Thanks in advance.
> 				---Shan---

A surface is usually thought of as a continuous image of a portion of
a plane.  The area would be the surface integral.  See Hildebrandt's
"Advanced Calculus for Applications" for a fairly good exposition.  

Think of dividing the surface up into jillions of little "rectangles"
and summing up the area of the rectangles.