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byte Definition

☆ byte (bīt)

noun

  1. a string of binary digits (bits), usually eight, operated on as a basic unit by a digital computer
  2. the basic unit of storage capacity in a computer system

Etymology: arbitrary formation

byte (B) Telecom Definition
A character in a computer coding scheme.A byte is a unique set of adjacent bits with a unique meaning in a computer coding scheme. A byte generally comprises eight (8) bits that represent a letter in an alphabet (e.g., a, A, z, or Z), a diacritical mark (e.g., ~ or `), a single digit number (e.g., 0, 1, 2, or 3), a punctuation mark (e.g., ,, ., or !), or a control character (e.g., paragraph break, page break, or carriage return).The size of a byte is specific to the coding scheme involved. For example, ACSII employs a coding scheme of seven (7) bits, so a byte is actually seven information bits, although the addition of a parity bit Bridge < 500 m < 2.5 km Terminator for error control results in a byte of eight (8) bits for storage and transmission purposes. An EBCDIC byte is truly eight (8) information bits. Unicode variously employs eight (8) and 16 bits. Computers create, store, manage, and output information in bytes.The origin of the term is uncertain, although it is certain that Dr. Werner Buchholz originated the term byte in 1956 when working for IBM on the STRETCH computer. Some suggest that byte is an alteration and contraction of bit, referring to the basic unit of information, and bite, referring to a morsel or chunk of data consumable by the early computer eight-bit processors. Others suggest byte is an acronym formed from binary digit eight. Still others suggest that byte is short for binary term. Computing and storage systems measure memory and storage capacities in bytes. For example, a kB (kiloByte) is actually 1,024 (2 10 ) bytes, since the measurement is based on a base 2, or binary, number system.The term kB comes from the fact that 1,024 is nominally, or approximately, 1,000. So, 64 kB of memory is actually 1,024
byte Usage Examples

Preposition: of

  • ram: RAM is a memory test program which tests each bit in each byte of user RAM, including the screen.

Converse of object

  • offset: Set the byte offset from which to restart broken transfers.
  • decode: When the XML parser reads in this as an XML document, it decodes the bytes into Unicode characters.
  • occupy: All that happens is that file and directory names occupy more bytes than they contain characters.

Adjective modifier

  • 8-bit: Integer A field described as Integer is a whole number which can be stored in four 8-bit bytes.
  • len: The length of the source string is len bytes.
  • least-significant: For a font using 2-byte matrix format, the default_char has byte1 in the most-significant byte and byte2 in the least-significant byte.
  • most-significant: For a font using 2-byte matrix format, the default_char has byte1 in the most-significant byte and byte2 in the least-significant byte.
  • null: Regular expression pattern strings may not contain null bytes, but can specify the null byte using the \ number notation.
  • 64k: The words shown above give access to all the memory, including the first 64k bytes.

Modifies a noun

  • array: The address is the start of a 7 byte array used by the Forth system for temporary storage.
  • throws: Parameters: b - the byte Throws: IOException If an I/O error has occurred.
  • array.: Toolkit Creates an image which decodes the image stored in the specified byte array. createImage ( byte[ ] , int, int ).
  • po: CString& insert ( size_t pos, const CString& str ); Insert a copy of the string str into self at byte position pos.
  • integer: The two operands are internally converted to 4 byte integers before the OR operation.
  • stream: Most of the functionality available for byte streams is also provided for character streams.

Noun used with modifier

  • b.length: FileOutputStream Writes b.length bytes from the specified byte array to this file output stream. write ( byte[ ] ).
  • low-order: For each character, one byte is written, the low-order byte, in exactly the manner of the writeByte method.
  • eight-bit: Character streams are like byte streams, but they contain 16-bit Unicode characters rather than eight-bit bytes.
  • n: The string at address addr1 of length n bytes is compared with that at addr2.

Browse dictionary entries near byte

  1. ‹ bystreet
  2. ‹ bystander
  3. ‹ byssus
  4. ‹ byssinosis
  5. ‹ Byronic
  6. ‹ Byron, Ada
  7. ‹ Byron
  8. ‹ byroad
  9. ‹ byre
  10. ‹ Byrd
  1. byte interleaving ›
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