"There are 10 types of people in the world, those who ready
binary and those who don't!"
Binary
If you read that as ten people, you don't read binary.
Binary is a mathematical system based on 2. Why? Because computers are
stupid and can't count any higher. Actually the real reason is because
they run on electricity. It's either On or Off. That's it. Look at Morse
Code, long or short.
Bits, Bytes and all the other stuff
Did you know that using the binary system, you can count
to 31 with ONE hand? Have you ever counted binary before? Open up the calculator
on your computer. Click View and click Scientific. Enter your age... Click the
Bin button. Mine comes out as "101010" The trick is to read from
right to left.
Normally, we use one finger to represent one number...
"1". Pick a number from one to five and then hold up that many fingers. How many
fingers do you have up? You just added one, that many times.
Now what if... your index finger represents the number "1" and your
middle finger represents the number "2", doubling every finger. Got it? Stay with me.
Remember, each finger
"represents" a different number.
Do you need to see it?
Let's say 0 is a down finger and 1 is an up finger...
We start with 0000 = 0
Then 0001 = 1
0010=2
0011=3
0100 = 4
0101=5
0110=6
0111=7
1000=8
1001=9
1010=10
1011=11
1100=12
1101=13
1110=14
1111=15
I hope I didn't loose anyone... we need to move on to
Hexadecimal
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