How does the Cooley-Tukey FFT algorithm work?

[andrey21]

First of all I apologies if I am in the wrong part of the forum for this question but here it is:
How do I go about finding the Fast Fourier Transform (FFT) for a given data set?

Homework Equations

Ive tried using FFT Magnitude = FFT (Real numbers)^2 + FFT (imaginary numbers)^2

From this I have plotted the values gained and seems to be correct, any advice greatly appreciated

 

[vela]

You plug your data into the FFT algorithm.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cooley–Tukey_FFT_algorithm