VTK/Examples/Cxx/PolyData/TriangleArea

TriangleArea.cxx

#include <vtkSmartPointer.h>
#include <vtkCellArray.h>
#include <vtkPoints.h>
#include <vtkPolyData.h>
#include <vtkTriangle.h>

int main(int, char *[])
{
  //setup points (geometry)
  vtkSmartPointer<vtkPoints> points = 
    vtkSmartPointer<vtkPoints>::New();
  points->InsertNextPoint ( 0.0, 0.0, 0.0 );
  points->InsertNextPoint ( 1.0, 0.0, 0.0 );
  points->InsertNextPoint ( 1.0, 1.0, 0.0 );
  points->InsertNextPoint ( 0.0, 1.0, 0.0 );

  //create a triangle on the three points in the polydata
  vtkSmartPointer<vtkTriangle> triangle1 = 
    vtkSmartPointer<vtkTriangle>::New();
  triangle1->GetPointIds()->SetId ( 0, 0 );
  triangle1->GetPointIds()->SetId ( 1, 1 );
  triangle1->GetPointIds()->SetId ( 2, 2 );

  vtkSmartPointer<vtkTriangle> triangle2 = 
    vtkSmartPointer<vtkTriangle>::New();
  triangle2->GetPointIds()->SetId ( 0, 2 );
  triangle2->GetPointIds()->SetId ( 1, 3 );
  triangle2->GetPointIds()->SetId ( 2, 0 );

  //add the triangles to the list of triangles
  vtkSmartPointer<vtkCellArray> triangles = 
    vtkSmartPointer<vtkCellArray>::New();
  triangles->InsertNextCell ( triangle1 );
  triangles->InsertNextCell ( triangle2 );

  //create a polydata object
  vtkSmartPointer<vtkPolyData> polydata = 
    vtkSmartPointer<vtkPolyData>::New();

  //add the geometry and topology to the polydata
  polydata->SetPoints ( points );
  polydata->SetPolys ( triangles );

  for(vtkIdType i = 0; i < polydata->GetNumberOfCells(); i++)
    {
    vtkCell* cell = polydata->GetCell(0);
    
    vtkTriangle* triangle = dynamic_cast<vtkTriangle*>(cell);
    double p0[3];
    double p1[3];
    double p2[3];
    triangle->GetPoints()->GetPoint(0, p0);
    std::cout << "p0: " << p0[0] << " " << p0[1] << " " << p0[2] << std::endl;
    triangle->GetPoints()->GetPoint(1, p1);
    std::cout << "p1: " << p1[0] << " " << p1[1] << " " << p1[2] << std::endl;
    triangle->GetPoints()->GetPoint(2, p2);
    std::cout << "p2: " << p2[0] << " " << p2[1] << " " << p2[2] << std::endl;
    
    double area = vtkTriangle::TriangleArea(p0, p1, p2);
    
    std::cout << "area of triangle " << i << ": " << area << std::endl;
    }
  return EXIT_SUCCESS;
}

Please try the new VTKExamples website.

CMakeLists.txt

cmake_minimum_required(VERSION 2.8)

PROJECT(TriangleArea)

find_package(VTK REQUIRED)
include(${VTK_USE_FILE})

add_executable(TriangleArea MACOSX_BUNDLE TriangleArea.cxx)

if(VTK_LIBRARIES)
  target_link_libraries(TriangleArea ${VTK_LIBRARIES})
else()
  target_link_libraries(TriangleArea vtkHybrid vtkWidgets)
endif()

Download and Build TriangleArea

Click here to download TriangleArea. and its CMakeLists.txt file.

Once the tarball TriangleArea.tar has been downloaded and extracted,

cd TriangleArea/build 

• If VTK is installed:

cmake ..

• If VTK is not installed but compiled on your system, you will need to specify the path to your VTK build:

cmake -DVTK_DIR:PATH=/home/me/vtk_build ..

Build the project:

make

and run it:

./TriangleArea

WINDOWS USERS PLEASE NOTE: Be sure to add the VTK bin directory to your path. This will resolve the VTK dll's at run time.