Stabbers of line segments in the plane

Abstract

The problem of computing a representation of the stabbing lines of a set S of segments in the plane was solved by Edelsbrunner et al. We provide efficient algorithms for the following problems: computing the stabbing wedges for S, finding a stabbing wedge for a set of parallel segments with equal length, and computing other stabbers for S such as a double-wedge and a zigzag. The time and space complexities of the algorithms depend on the number of combinatorially different extreme lines, critical lines, and the number of different slopes that appear in S.