CORDIC

CORDIC (for "coordinate rotation digital computer"), also known as Volder's algorithm, or: Digit-by-digit method Circular CORDIC (Jack E. Volder), Linear CORDIC, Hyperbolic CORDIC (John Stephen Walther), and Generalized Hyperbolic CORDIC (GH CORDIC) (Yuanyong Luo et al.), is a simple and efficient algorithm to calculate trigonometric functions, hyperbolic functions, square roots, multiplications, divisions, and exponentials and logarithms with arbitrary base, typically converging with one digit (or bit) per iteration. CORDIC is therefore also an example of digit-by-digit algorithms. CORDIC and closely related methods known as pseudo-multiplication and pseudo-division or factor combining are commonly used when no hardware multiplier is available (e.g. in simple microcontrollers and FPGAs), as the only operations it requires are additions, subtractions, bitshift and lookup tables. As such, they all belong to the class of shift-and-add algorithms. In computer science, CORDIC is often used to implement floating-point arithmetic when the target platform lacks hardware multiply for cost or space reasons. Similar mathematical techniques were published by Henry Briggs as early as 1624 and Robert Flower in 1771, but CORDIC is better optimized for low-complexity finite-state CPUs. CORDIC was conceived in 1956 by Jack E. Volder at the aeroelectronics department of Convair out of necessity to replace the analog resolver in the B-58 bomber's navigation computer with a more accurate and faster real-time digital solution. Therefore, CORDIC is sometimes referred to as a digital resolver. In his research Volder was inspired by a formula in the 1946 edition of the CRC Handbook of Chemistry and Physics: where is such that , and . His research led to an internal technical report proposing the CORDIC algorithm to solve sine and cosine functions and a prototypical computer implementing it. The report also discussed the possibility to compute hyperbolic coordinate rotation, logarithms and exponential functions with modified CORDIC algorithms.