THE BASICS

Bit
In terms of electronic information, or computer data, nothing is smaller than the ‘bit’, an abbreviation of ‘binary digit’. These ones and zeros represent the lifeblood of a computer, buzzing between the processor, memory chips and data-storage devices, such as the hard disk.

In transit, bits are represented by nothing more than brief electronic pulses that zip through the various components on a computer’s motherboard. Bits can, however, have a physical presence too.

On a CD, for example, bits are represented as minuscule pits etched onto the disc’s surface. When these are ‘read’ by a CD-Rom drive’s laser beam, they’re converted into the electrical pulses that a computer can understand.

Obviously, a solitary bit isn’t particularly useful but, when strung together, they can represent numbers using a binary system (or base two – decimal is base 10).

Everything in a computer is represented as a binary number and everything a computer does is done by performing calculations on binary numbers. Thankfully, you don’t need to know anything about bits and binary to use a computer, but an understanding of bigger collections of bits is useful.

Byte
Eight bits make a byte and a byte is the smallest collection of bits that a computer can work with. If you know your binary, you’ll know that a byte can represent any decimal number from 0 to 255.

Bytes are also used to represent letters, numbers and other symbols using an arcane system known as ASCII so that when you type the letter A on your keyboard, the computer records it as the ASCII code 65 – represented in binary as 01000001 – which is one byte of data.

Kilobyte (Kb)
Even though it contains eight bits, a byte still isn’t much use alone and it’s only when bytes are grouped together that a computer can do something meaningful with them.

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