Cosine
I'm trying to understand how cosine works. In all the books I've read, they say it's the adjacent side divided by the hypotenuse:
Cos Ө = adjacent side
-------------
hypotenuse
But lets say the opposite side of a triangle is 3, the adjacent side is 4. Doing the pythagorean theorum:
C = Sqr(3² + 4²) = 5
3, 4, and 5. Simple enough. Now when dividing the adjacent side (4) by the hypotenuse (5):
Cos Ө = .8
Now what is .8 suppose to represent, an angle of the triangle? Is it an angle in radians, or degrees, or what? Can someone help me understand this. Thanks in advance.
Cosine is the horizontal coordinate of a point on the unit circle at angle θ.
I hope MathWorld doesn't mind me leeching their images.
I hope MathWorld doesn't mind me leeching their images.
So it's the angle that's from the center of the circle in the image in that corner of the triangle? Is it in radians or degrees?
The .8 is the ratio between the lengths of the sides of the triangle. If the triangle was a different size but the angles were the same, this ratio would also stay the same (for example, a 6 8 10 triangle).
The angle fully determines the ratio between lengths of the sides. The cosine function is a function from the angle to this ratio.
The angle fully determines the ratio between lengths of the sides. The cosine function is a function from the angle to this ratio.
Ok I'm now thinking it was .8 radians, cause I was playing around with the values, and got 36.8698966198457 degrees converted to radians, which gave me .8. Was this right?
Cos(36.8698966198457 * PI / 180) = .8
Cos(36.8698966198457 * PI / 180) = .8
The result of cos is not an angle. It is not in radians. It is just the x-value of the coordinate on the unit circle at the angle you give it.
Oh I didn't know that. The book says Cos Ө = .8, so I assumed that it was the angle that it returned. So how would you retrieve the angle from this ratio between the length of the sides?
Quote:Original post by Jacob Roman
Oh I didn't know that. The book says Cos Ө = .8, so I assumed that it was the angle that it returned. So how would you retrieve the angle from this ratio between the length of the sides?
By using the inverse of the functions, cos-1, sin-1, and tan-1 which translate to in C++, asin, acos, atan. Note that the resulting angle is returned in radians, so you need to convert it to degrees. More info here.
To find the angle, theta, you need to rearrange cos(theta) = 4/5, to find theta. So, theta = arccos(4/5).
Is this clear enough?
Is this clear enough?
To find the angle using asin,acos or atan (Inverse of sin,cos and tan) you first need to picture the triangle shown in the figure by Ra.The angle will be equal to the sin inverse(asin) of opposite side/hypotenuse OR cos inverse(acos) of adjacent side/hypotenuse OR tan inverse(atan) of opposite side/adjacent side.
This topic is closed to new replies.
Advertisement
Popular Topics
Advertisement