In this case the title is only a clue.
In a number base, , apply the following throwingAway procedure on a number : while the current version of is greater or equal to , replace with the sum of its digits in base arithmetic. If the single digit result is equal to , then replace that result with .
Two examples:
and , since , add , since , add , since , the answer is .
and , since , add , since , add , since , the answer is .
Next, form a histogram of applying the throwingAway procedure in base 60 to all positive integers from 1 to .
Select the most frequently occurring answer, if more than digit is the most frequent, then any will do.
The answer is the frequency selected. What is that frequency?
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In base 1 0 , the throwingAway procedure is called "casting away nines", hence the title of the problem.
Regardless of base b , the integers from 1 to b m − 1 distribute evenly under the throwAway procedure, resulting in a frequency per digit in that base of ∑ i = 0 m − 1 b i , which when written in base b results in an integer of m 1s. In the case of this problem, 1 1 1 1 1 1 6 0 = 7 9 0 7 7 9 6 6 1 1 0 .