Digital Data Flashcards
Digital Data
Decimal System
A numbering system that uses ten digits, 0 through 9.
Binary System
A numbering system that uses two digits, 0 and 1.
Hexadecimal System
A numbering system that uses sixteen digits, 0 through 9, and A through F.
Bit
The smallest unit of digital information, represented by a 1 or 0.
Byte
A group of eight bits joined together.
Digital Data
A physical signal, such as text, numbers, graphics, or sound, interpreted by converting it into binary numbers.
Encoded Integers
The representation of integers using a group of bytes. Normally, one bit in one of the byes represents the sign, 1 for negative and 0 for positive. The remaining 31 bits are used to encode the number itself using binary digits.
Encoded Text
The representation of text by assigning a unique binary code to each character.
Processor Speed
The speed at which a computer processes information, as measured by the number of cycles per second (Hertz) that the computer’s CPU operates at. Processor speed is measured in kilohertz, megahertz, and gigahertz.
Storage Space
The measurement in bytes of the volume that a storage device can contain. Storage space is measured in kilobytes (1024 bytes), megabytes (1024 kilobytes), gigabytes (1024 megabytes), and terabytes (1024 gigabytes).
Throughput
The measurement in bits per second that information is transferred through a network from one computer to another. Throughput is measured in Kbps (kilobits per second), Mbps (megabits per second), and Gbps (gigabits per second).
ASCII
Pronounced ask-ee and short for American Standard Code for Information Interchange, the most common format for text files in computers on the internet where each character is represented by a unique 7-bit binary code. Extended ASCII uses an 8-bit binary code and allows for international characters.
Unicode
An international 16-bit encoding standard that accommodates character sets from multiple languages, with each letter, digit, or symbol being assigned a unique numeric value.
