TITLE: Name for "decimals" in other bases?
QUESTION [9 upvotes]: In grade school, numbers that use a positional notation along with a decimal point (to delimit integer and fractional parts of a number are called "decimals". This "point" notation is easily generalized to any base, e.g., in base 2, we can write the number 101.11, and the point is then called a binary point. But what is the number itself called—a "binary"? (doesn't sound right, somehow, but it is analogous to the base 10 term "decimal"). Surely we can't continue to call it a "decimal" given that the base isn't 10; that definitely doesn't seem right.
Is there a base-independent term for a positional number containing a radix point?
Thank you

REPLY [3 votes]: I would call numbers that are not integers non-integers, or possibly non-integral or fractional numbers if I really wanted an adjective.  This is a representation-independent concept — it just happens that it coincides with the set of numbers that cannot be written in positional notation, for any given base, without a radix point.
For the digits after the radix point themselves, that's exactly what I'd call them.  It's a bit verbose, but gets the point across unambiguously.  Should I find myself wanting a shorter name for them, I might try fractional digits (and substitute digits with the appropriate base-specific name, such as bits, if there is one) or perhaps $n$-ary places by analogy with "decimal places" (again substituting the appropriate name for $n$-ary).