ABSTRACT
This chapter changes from Cartesian to polar co-ordinates and also changes from polar to Cartesian co-ordinates. It uses a scientific notation calculator to change from Cartesian to polar co-ordinates and vice-versa. Applications where Cartesian co-ordinates would be used include any navigation on a grid and anything involving raster graphics (i.e. bitmap – a dot matrix data structure representing a generally rectangular grid of pixels). The ability to change from Cartesian to polar co-ordinates is vitally important when using complex numbers and their use in a.c. electrical circuit theory and with vector geometry. Another name for Cartesian co-ordinates is rectangular co-ordinates. Many scientific notation calculators possess Pol and Rec functions. ‘Rec’ is an abbreviation of ‘rectangular’ (i.e. Cartesian) and ‘Pol’ is an abbreviation of ‘polar’.
