| Title: | Mathematics at DEC | 
| Moderator: | RUSURE::EDP | 
| Created: | Mon Feb 03 1986 | 
| Last Modified: | Fri Jun 06 1997 | 
| Last Successful Update: | Fri Jun 06 1997 | 
| Number of topics: | 2083 | 
| Total number of notes: | 14613 | 
If you've seen Donald Duck in Mathemagic Land, you probably remember the part
with the Golden Rectangle.  They then constructed a spiral curving from
a-b-g-h-i (in my rendition below).  I'd like a formula for the spiral.
As an approximation, I was going to deal with it in 90� pieces.  For the first
piece, I was going to start with an arc starting at a, centered at c.  As I
swing the arc toward b, however, I would decrease the radius and slide the
center to d.  For the next segment, the centerpoint would move from d to e as
the arc swung to g.
Would someone provide me with a better algorithm.?  It seems to me that this
method would only be continuous for the zeroth and first derivative.
								-- Chuck Newman
              c  h
a---------------------
|             |  |    |
|            i|--|    |
|            d|-------|g
|             |  e    |
|             |       |
|             |       |
|             |       |
 ---------------------
              b
| T.R | Title | User | Personal Name | Date | Lines | 
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1768.1 | AUSSIE::GARSON | nouveau pauvre | Wed Jun 16 1993 01:14 | 17 | |
|     re .0
    
    I'm not familiar with Donald Duck etc. but from the looks of it, with
    suitable choice of axes, in polar coordinates, you want to fit an
    equation of the form:
    
          �
    r = Ak
    
    where 0 < k < 1
    
    Having done this it should be easy to come up with parametric equations
    for x and y in terms of � if you want Cartesian coordinates.
    
    I recall that the above is called a "logarithmic spiral".
    
    HTH
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