Interprets EXPR as an octal string and returns the corresponding
value. (If EXPR happens to start off with 0x, interprets it as a
hex string. If EXPR starts off with 0b, it is interpreted as a
binary string. Leading whitespace is ignored in all three cases.)
The following will handle decimal, binary, octal, and hex in the standard
Perl or C notation:
$val = oct($val) if $val =~ /^0/;
If EXPR is omitted, uses $_. To go the other way (produce a number
in octal), use sprintf() or printf():
$perms = (stat("filename"))[2] & 07777;
$oct_perms = sprintf "%lo", $perms;
The oct() function is commonly used when a string such as 644 needs
to be converted into a file mode, for example. (Although perl will
automatically convert strings into numbers as needed, this automatic
conversion assumes base 10.)
Take our 
