octal

<mathematics>

Number base eight. The octal number representation uses the digits 0-7 only, with the right-most digit counting ones, the next counting multiples of 8, then 8^2 = 64, etc. For example, octal 177 is digital 127: 

 digit    weight        value
   1     8^2 = 64   1* 64 = 64
   7     8^1 =  8   7*  8 = 56
   7     8^0 =  1   7*  1 =  7
 	           ---
 	 	  127
Octal representation used to be widespread back when many computers used six-bit bytes, as six-bits can be conveniently written as a two-digit octal number. Since nowadays a byte is almost always eight bits long, the octal system lost most of its appeal to the hexadecimal system. Octal is still found in the C programming language and its descendents where it is commonly to represent characters, as in 'A' = '\101', 101 being octal for 65, the ASCII character code for 'A'.

For a brief discussion on the word `octal' see hexadecimal.

Last updated: 2017-12-18

Octave

<language>

A high-level interactive language by John W. Eaton, with help from many others, like MATLAB, primarily intended for numerical computations. Octave provides a convenient command line interface for solving linear and nonlinear problems numerically.

Octave can do arithmetic for real and complex scalars and matrices, solve sets of nonlinear algebraic equations, integrate functions over finite and infinite intervals, and integrate systems of ordinary differential and differential-algebraic equations.

Octave has been compiled and tested with g++ and libg++ on a SPARCstation 2 running SunOS 4.1.2, an IBM RS/6000 running AIX 3.2.5, DEC Alpha systems running OSF/1 1.3 and 3.0, a DECstation 5000/240 running Ultrix 4.2a, and Intel 486 systems running Linux. It should work on most other Unix systems with g++ and libg++.

Octave is distributed under the GNU General Public License. It requires gnuplot, a C++ compiler and Fortran compiler or f2c translator.

home.

ftp://ftp.che.wisc.edu/pub/octave/ or your nearest GNU archive site.

E-mail: <[email protected]>.

Last updated: 2000-06-27

Nearby terms:

OC-n ♦ OCODE ♦ OCP ♦ OCR ♦ OCS ♦ octal ♦ Octave ♦ octet ♦ octothorpe ♦ OCX ♦ OD390

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