oc·tet / äkˈtet/ (also oc·tette) • n. a group of eight people or things, in particular: ∎  a group of eight musicians. ∎  a musical composition for eight voices or instruments. ∎  the first eight lines of a sonnet. ∎  Chem. a stable group of eight electrons occupying a single shell in an atom.

octet (Fr. octuor, octette; It. ottetto; Ger. Oktett). Any combination of 8 performers or any piece of mus. comp. for such. The normal str. octet is for 4 vn., 2 va., 2 vc., as in Mendelssohn's. Schubert's Octet is for 2 vn., va., vc., db., cl., bn., and hn. That by Stravinsky is for wind instr.

octet Eight contiguous bits; an eight bit byte. The term is used instead of byte to prevent confusion in cases where the term has preexisting hardware associations, as in machines with 7-bit bytes, 9-bit bytes, 12-bit bytes.