GNU Collaborative International Dictionary of English

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Found 2 definitions 

  1.       

    Curve, n. [See Curve, a., Cirb.]
    1. A bending without angles; that which is bent; a flexure; as, a curve in a railway or canal.
      1913 Webster
    2. (Geom.) A line described according to some low, and having no finite portion of it a straight line.
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      Axis of a curve. See under Axis. -- Curve of quickest descent. See Brachystochrone. -- Curve tracing (Math.), the process of determining the shape, location, singular points, and other peculiarities of a curve from its equation. -- Plane curve (Geom.), a curve such that when a plane passes through three points of the curve, it passes through all the other points of the curve. Any other curve is called a curve of double curvature, or a twisted curve.
      1913 Webster
    
      
    
  2.       

    Plane , a. [L. planus: cf. F. plan. See Plan, a.] Without elevations or depressions; even; level; flat; lying in, or constituting, a plane; as, a plane surface.
    1913 Webster
    ☞ In science, this word (instead of plain) is almost exclusively used to designate a flat or level surface.
    1913 Webster
    Plane angle, the angle included between two straight lines in a plane. -- Plane chart, Plane curve. See under Chart and Curve. -- Plane figure, a figure all points of which lie in the same plane. If bounded by straight lines it is a rectilinear plane figure, if by curved lines it is a curvilinear plane figure. -- Plane geometry, that part of geometry which treats of the relations and properties of plane figures. -- Plane problem, a problem which can be solved geometrically by the aid of the right line and circle only. -- Plane sailing (Naut.), the method of computing a ship's place and course on the supposition that the earth's surface is a plane. -- Plane scale (Naut.), a scale for the use of navigators, on which are graduated chords, sines, tangents, secants, rhumbs, geographical miles, etc. -- Plane surveying, surveying in which the curvature of the earth is disregarded; ordinary field and topographical surveying of tracts of moderate extent. -- Plane table, an instrument used for plotting the lines of a survey on paper in the field. -- Plane trigonometry, the branch of trigonometry in which its principles are applied to plane triangles.
    1913 Webster

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