More efficient soft decoding of the Golay codes

An algorithm for maximum-likelihood soft-decision decoding of the binary (24,12,8) Golay code is presented. The algorithm involves projecting the codewords of the binary Golay code onto the codewords of the (6,3,4) code over GF(4)-the hexacode. The complexity of the proposed algorithm is at most 651 real operations. Along similar lines, the tetracode may be employed for decoding the ternary (12,6,6) Golay code with only 530 real operations. The proposed algorithm also implies a reduction in the number of computations required for decoding the Leech lattice.