Sentence examples for straightedge from inspiring English sources
noun
A tool which is flat, rectangular and commonly made of wood, metal or plastic and is used to draw, cut or check the straightness of straight lines.
Although no one succeeded in finding a solution with straightedge and compass, they did succeed with a mechanical device and by a trick.
For instance, two problems from Euclid's time requiring the use of only a compass and a straightedge (unmarked ruler)—trisecting an angle and constructing a square with an area equal to a given circle were pursued for centuries before they were shown to be impossible.
Although Euclid solves more than 100 construction problems in the Elements, many more were posed whose solutions required more than just compass and straightedge.
The drafting machine, introduced about 1930, allows a straightedge to be moved while maintaining any desired angle between it and the edge of the drawing board.
This alignment is performed with the aid of an alidade, or sight rule, a straightedge fitted with simple sights.
285 212/211 bc) made use of neusis (the sliding and maneuvering of a measured length, or marked straightedge) to solve one of the great problems of ancient geometry: constructing an angle that is one-third the size of a given angle.
Euclid arbitrarily restricted the tools of construction to a straightedge (an unmarked ruler) and a compass.
Square, in measurement, device consisting of two straightedges set at right angles to each other.
Only scanty evidence exists that graduated rules were used in the Middle Ages and the Renaissance; plain straightedges seem to have predominated.
Mr. Matos usually sketches before painting freehand, making limited use of stencils and straightedges.
It consists of a drawing board mounted on a tripod or other stable support and of a straightedge usually with sights for accurate aim (the alidade) to the objects to be mapped along which lines are drawn.
