2.3 UNSIGNED BINARY NUMBER SYSTEM 33
where d
i
is the decimal digit in the i th position. Exclusive of possible leading and trailing
zeros, the MSD and LSD for this number are 3 and 8, respectively. This number could have
been written in a form such as N
10
= 03017.52800 without altering its value but implying
greater accuracy of the fraction portion.
2.3 UNSIGNED BINARY NUMBER SYSTEM
Applying Eqs. (2.1) and (2.2) to the binary system requires that r = 2, indicating that there
are two distinguishable characters, typically 0 and (r − 1) = 1, that are used. In positional
representation these characters (numbers) are called binary digits or bits. Examples of the
positional and polynomial notations for a binary number are
N
2
=(b
n−1
···b
3
b
2
b
1
b
0
·b
−1
b
−2
b
−3
···b