Special right triangle than 256: Isosceles right-angled triangles cannot have sides with integer values, because the ratio of the hypotenuse to either other side is , but cannot be expressed as a ratio of two integers. However, infinitely many "almost-isosceles" right triangles do exist. These are right-angled triangles with integral sides for which the lengths of the non-hypotenuse edges differ by one. Such almost-isosceles right-angled triangles can be obtained recursively, "a" is length of hypotenuse, "n" = 1, 2, 3, ... Equivalently, where {"x", "y"} are the solutions to the Pell equation , with the hypotenuse "y" being the odd terms of the
Gauss's Pythagorean right triangle proposal according to his view a correspondence with the inhabitants of the moon could only be begun by means of such mathematical contemplations and ideas, which we and they have in common." Crowe concluded in sum that his review of earliest sources failed to confirm the detail of the proposal and Gauss as its author, but that his origination of the idea was not unlikely given the existing evidence. Gauss's Pythagorean right triangle proposal Gauss's Pythagorean right triangle proposal is an idea attributed to Carl Friedrich Gauss for a method to signal extraterrestrial beings by constructing an immense right triangle and