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I'm doing some Java code. As far as I can tell, Java only has functions that do natural log and base $10$ log. I have a requirement to specify the base. I've seen that doing $\ln x/ \ln b$ is the same as $\log_b x$.

I've done this and it seems to work. I'd like to better understand why though.

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  • $\begingroup$ As an example: $\log_{100}(1\phantom,\!000\phantom,\!000)=3$; $\dfrac{\log(1\phantom,\!000\phantom,\!000)}{\log(100)}=\dfrac62=3$. (Using the base-10 logarithm here) $\endgroup$ – Akiva Weinberger May 5 '16 at 20:47
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Let $y = \log_b x$. This is the same as $x = b^y$.

If you take the natural logarithm on both sides you get $$\ln x = \ln b^y = y \ln b$$ so that $y = \dfrac{\ln x}{\ln b}$. That is, $$ \log_b x = \frac{\ln x}{\ln b}.$$

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  • $\begingroup$ Could you explain why \ln b^y = y \ln b$$. I follow up until that part and after. $\endgroup$ – Jeff May 5 '16 at 19:35
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    $\begingroup$ That is one of the laws of logarithms and can be proved in a similar way. If $z = y \ln b$ then $z/y = \ln b$ and $e^{z/y} = b$. Raise both sides to the $y$ power to get $e^z = b^y$ which is the same as $z = \ln b^y$. $\endgroup$ – Umberto P. May 5 '16 at 19:38

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