Hi Rinus I've thought quite a bit about your requirement. I cannot think of a way to calculate the angle other than an iterative process. However such a process should be fairly straightforward, and also what computers are good at after all.
Calculation of the enclosing rectangle for any given angle is fairly straight forward. The result whether you rotated the axiis by alpha or rotated the object by minus alpha would be the same. I would recommend the latter then the calculation is as simple as looping through each transformed node and getting min and max on each axis x .and y Having put this calculation in a function stage 2 would be to calculate area in a for next loop to get area for 0 degrees , 1 degree .... up to 359 degrees. Then depending on the accuracy required say first result returns 63 degrees as minimum then run calc from: 62.0 62.1 .... up to 63.9 in half degree steps. If this 62.6 do 62.51 to 62.69 etc until significant figure required is reached. Sounds cumbersome but it would be very quick on a computer. Hope this helps. Regards Bob www.MapsByDesign.co.uk -- bob young --------------------------------------------------------------------- List hosting provided by Directions Magazine | www.directionsmag.com | To unsubscribe, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] For additional commands, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Message number: 18300