The integer represented as 4703 in standard decimal notation is written in this way because
The same integer can be written in terms of powers of 8 as follows:
The expression on the right-hand side is abbreviated to 111378 and is the representation of this number to base 8 (or octal). In general, if g is an integer greater than 1, any positive integer a can be written uniquely as
where each ci is a non-negative integer less than g. This is the representation of a to base g and is abbreviated to . Real numbers, not just integers, can also be written to any base, by using figures after a ‘decimal’ point, just as familiar decimal representations of real numbers are written to base 10. See also binary representation, decimal, hexadecimal.