Chapter 4. A REVIEW OF DATA REPRESENTATION AND THE MATHEMATICS OF COMPUTING
We use decimal (base 10) numbers to represent numeric information, and we use various alphabets and symbol systems to represent other types of information. In contrast, computers understand only one basic type of information: ones and zeros, which themselves are representative of either an on or off electrical state within the hardware of the device. These ones and zeros are combined in various ways to form more common data elements that we are used to finding in computers: regular numbers, characters, and files. However, all of these are really only abstractions; the ones ...
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