I picked many points on the edge of a lake in Google Maps and I already have xdata, ydata of the points. some people tell me that I should use the method of fitting a Gaussian function for these points and then measure the area of the lake. but I can't understand how I can measure the area of the lake after I fit all of points with Gaussian process. Does anyone have a solution for this?
They mean to use the shoelace formula, also known as Gauss' area formula. There is no Gaussian fitting here.