Circle of a sphere Circle of a sphere A circle of a sphere is a circle that lies on a sphere. Such a circle can be formed as the intersection of a sphere and a plane, or of two spheres. A circle on a sphere whose plane passes through the center of the sphere is called a great circle; otherwise it is a small circle. Circles of a sphere have radius less than or equal to the sphere radius, with equality when the circle is a great circle. In the geographic coordinate system on a globe, the parallels of latitude are such circles, with
Distance from a point to a line the same point and the line is |"ax" + "c"| / |"a"|, as measured along a horizontal line segment. If the line passes through two points "P"=("x","y") and "P"=("x","y") then the distance of (x,y) from the line is: The denominator of this expression is the distance between "P" and "P". The numerator is twice the area of the triangle with its vertices at the three points, (x,y), "P" and "P". See: . The expression is equivalent to formula_4, which can be obtained by rearranging the standard formula for the area of a triangle: formula_5, where "b" is the length of