Method and apparatus for performing division using a rectangular aspect ratio multiplier

A circuit for performing exact division of a dividend by a divisor, comprising:

• a rectangular array multiplier;
• circuitry associated with said multiplier for obtaining a short reciprocal of said divisor;
• circuitry associated with said multiplier for facilitating the multiplication of said short reciprocal by said dividend to yield a first product;
• circuitry associated with said multiplier for truncating said first product to have less bits than said divisor to yield a first quotient digit value;
• circuitry associated with said multiplier for facilitating the generation of a product of said first quotient digit value and said divisor;
• circuitry associated with said multiplier for computing the difference between said dividend and said product of said first quotient digit value and said divisor to yield a first partial remainder;
• circuitry associated with said multiplier for facilitating the multiplication of said short reciprocal by said first partial remainder to yield a subsequent product;
• circuitry associated with said multiplier for truncating said subsequent product to have less bits than said divisor to yield a subsequent quotient digit value;
• circuitry associated with said multiplier for facilitating the generation of a product of said subsequent quotient digit value and said divisor;
• and
• circuitry associated with said multiplier for computing the difference between said first partial remainder and said product of said subsequent quotient digit value and said divisor to yield a new partial remainder, said first quotient digit value and said subsequent quotient digit value calculated such that said partial remainder and said new partial remainder have magnitudes corresponding to less than one unit in the last place of said first quotient digit value and said subsequent quotient digit value, respectively.