What this chapter is about
Humans interact with computers using familiar symbols—alphabets, numerals, punctuation marks, and special characters. Yet computers fundamentally work with only two states: electrical signals representing 0 and 1. The gap between human-recognizable information and computer's binary language must be bridged through systematic encoding schemes. When you press the letter 'A' on a keyboard, that physical action must be converted into a numeric code, then further transformed into binary for the computer to process. Different writing systems—English, Hindi, Chinese, Arabic—each require different encoding approaches. Number systems provide the mathematical foundation for understanding how different bases (binary, octal, decimal, hexadecimal) represent the same quantity differently. Understanding encoding schemes and number systems is fundamental to comprehending how computers represent, store, and transmit all types of information. This chapter explores how encoding works, examines various number systems, and demonstrates conversions between different representations.
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Learning objectives
- 1Explain data Representation, Conversion, and Information Encoding
- 2Explain eNCODING SCHEMES
- 3Explain aSCII Encoding
- 4Explain extended ASCII
- 5Explain uNICODE Encoding
- 6Explain other Encoding Standards