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Anyone know best acronym or symbol for semi octave?
Posted: Sat Sep 28, 2019 6:22 am
by wlangfor@uoguelph.ca
Hi all, making a fancy knob and most recently I was wanting to make a nice touch to a knob. But, I wasn't sure how semi octaves have been truncated down to an acronym or a symbol.
Any advice would be appreciated, thanks

Re: Anyone know best acronym or symbol for semi octave?
Posted: Sat Sep 28, 2019 8:09 am
by tulamide
There is no real need for half an octave (technically it is a diminished fifth/augmented fourth). Not going too deep into music theory, but music is built upon intervals. This is done to circumvent frequency issues. No matter the scale, specific intervals keep the same. There's minors, majors and perfects of second, third, fourth etc., but with the exception of 6 semitones. A perfect fifth, for example, spans 7 semitones, while a perfect fourth spans 5 semitones.
There are also short forms of named intervals, but they are rarely used. In fact, I had to look them up on Wiki. A diminshed fifth would be "d5", an augmented fourth "A4". A perfect fifth "P5".
A perfect fifth would make more sense musically than "half an octave", as it is the base for the circle of fifth, on which every modern music is based on.
Re: Anyone know best acronym or symbol for semi octave?
Posted: Sat Sep 28, 2019 3:56 pm
by guyman
^^^ Tula is correct.
the octave is already the perfect subdivision, and the fifth is the only further cut i would make, unless you go to semitone.
Re: Anyone know best acronym or symbol for semi octave?
Posted: Sat Sep 28, 2019 7:13 pm
by wlangfor@uoguelph.ca
yes, I see. It really does boil down to these things. What is a semi-tone? Yes, indeed. Well, I suppose it will come down to intensive research in regards to that, and I suppose with work it will make more sense to the end user.