Bits and Bytes

At the smallest scale in the computer, information is stored as bits and bytes. In this section, we'll learn how bits and bytes encode information.

Bit

Everything in a computer is 0's and 1's. The bit stores just a 0 or 1: it's the smallest building block of storage.

Byte

How Many Patterns With N Bits? (demo)

How many different patterns can be made with 1, 2, or 3 bits?

Number of bits Different Patterns
1 0 1
2 00 01 10 11
3 000 001 010 011
100 101 110 111
Number of bits Different Patterns
1 0 1
2 00 01 10 11
3 000 001 010 011
100 101 110 111

One Byte - 256 Patterns (demo)

Bytes

Bytes and Characters - ASCII Code

32 space
33 !
34 "
35 #
36 $
37 %
38 &
39 '
40 (
41 )
42 *
43 +
44 ,
45 -
46 .
47 /
48 0
49 1
50 2
51 3
52 4
53 5
54 6
55 7
56 8
57 9
58 :
59 ;
60 <
61 =
62 >
63 ?
64 @
65 A
66 B
67 C
68 D
69 E
70 F
71 G
72 H
73 I
74 J
75 K
76 L
77 M
78 N
79 O
80 P
81 Q
82 R
83 S
84 T
85 U
86 V
87 W
88 X
89 Y
90 Z
91 [
92 \
93 ]
94 ^
95 _
96 `
97 a
98 b
99 c
100 d
101 e
102 f
103 g
104 h
105 i
106 j
107 k
108 l
109 m
110 n
111 o
112 p
113 q
114 r
115 s
116 t
117 u
118 v
119 w
120 x
121 y
122 z
123 {
124 |
125 }
126 ~

Typing, Bytes, and You


typed letters correspond to bytes in RAM

Numbers in Computers