Octal

The base 8 notational system for representing real numbers. The digits used are 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, and 7, so that  (8 in base 10) is represented as  () in base 8. The following table gives the octal equivalents of the first few decimal numbers.

The song "New Math" by Tom Lehrer (That Was the Year That Was, 1965) explains how to compute  in octal. (The answer is .)

REFERENCES:

Lauwerier, H. Fractals: Endlessly Repeated Geometric Figures. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, pp. 9-10, 1991.

Wells, D. The Penguin Dictionary of Curious and Interesting Numbers. Middlesex, England: Penguin Books, pp. 72-73, 1986.