All the positive perfect squares 1, 4, 9, 16, 25.... are written in strictly ascending order of magnitude and without the commas and spaces, resulting in the following infinite string:

149162536496481100121144......

Reading left to right, what is the 2010^th digit in the above pattern?

(In reply to Computer verification by Jim Keneipp)

In QuickBasic I get a 4 when executing

 YEAR = 2010

  FOR i = 1 TO 1000
      s$ = s$ + STR$(i ^ 2)
      IF LEN(s$) >= YEAR THEN EXIT FOR
  NEXT i

  PRINT MID$(s$, YEAR, 1)
  END

because of the space that STR$() gives as the first byte of the string

 YEAR = 2010

  FOR i = 1 TO 1000
      s$ = s$ + LTRIM$(STR$(i ^ 2))
      IF LEN(s$) >= YEAR THEN EXIT FOR
  NEXT i

  PRINT MID$(s$, YEAR, 1)
  END

gives the correct 6.

What version of Basic are you using?

Posted by Charlie on 2010-01-28 14:24:29