Binary - Decimal - Hexidecimal

Wow, seeing lots of 0 and 1's right now, I am sure some of you have had experience of binary code, I knew it existed obviously but have never used it, so right now I have been working and doing all the exercises and the optional ones to really get my head round it, I understand it to a point and can figure out how to make the numbers and understand that 0001 is 1 and 0010 is two and the progression and then they went and confused me with the negatives and the unsigned and signed and now I am a jibbering mess.

Hexadecimal I have used in HTML, when changing the background colour of a site or font colour, I assume that is the hexadecimal ie hexadecimal system #000000 black to #FFFFFF white

well anyway, I shall get my head back into the binary and see what more sense I can make of it, any of you geeks nerds and boffins care to share what wisdom you may have about binary....


Thanks

K

lmao sorry ignor what I said before lol
signed is not that thats something different, will delete lol
unsigned =

Code:

[8][4][2][1]
so 1111 = 8+4+2+1 =15

signed =

Code:

[-8][4][2][1]
so 1111 = -8+4+2+1 = -1

hope this clears things up

in signed the left most digit is equal to negative the value it normally has.

e.g.

16|8|4|2|1 unsigned
-16|8|4|2|1 signed


again for reference

binary = two states (0,1)
decimal = ten states (0,1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9)
hexadecimal = sixteen states (0,1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,A,B,C,D,E,F)

Yeh that does make alot more sense then what you wrote before, and I actually understand what you are talking about on this post .

Thanks Shovi

You are too far ahead ...

signed and unsigned.
I look at it as a storage place, variable and the number that the variable can represent.
signed can represent negative and positive numbers.
unsigned only represent positive numbers. because they both have the same amount (of range) to play with that mean that in order to represent negative number we need to cut half of the storage place that the positive use and to give it to the negative half. i.e. one byte can store 0 to 255 when it unsigned. and when it's signed -128 to 127.

anyway, hope it's readable

Oh right so basically when at the beginning of the book it was talking about analogue and digital, and the examples they used with being infinite numbers between the thermometers temperature and then discrete quantities, wow that really all clicks into place now much like a discrete volume control.......so that signed and unsigned also have there different variables like analogue and discrete(digital), with the ranges that they cover... well it now makes sense to me in a weird round a bout way so I hope I have figured it right.

thank you for all you help, and yes I know I am ahead I also know I will have to go back to activities when everyone else is there, I am going to finish book 3 and then start on my TMA.

Kerensa

Yes remember that any number no matter whether it is in binary decimal or whatever merely is a representation of a value.

We use the most logical methods we can think of in order to represent the values.

All the normal methods follow some sort of pattern i.e.

Code:

0001 = 1
0010 = 2
0011 = 3
0100 = 4
0101 = 5
0110 = 6
0111 = 7
1000 = 8
etc

but we could easily use a random choice to depict the same values or even different values

so for example

Code:

0100 = 1
0010 = 2
1110 = 3
0110 = 4
0001 = 5
etc

As you can see in the above code, there is no pattern but the values can still be assigned to different binary numbers it’s merely a question of how you interpret it.

NOTE: As shoshiko says there is still only space for so many values given a set of characters and size of characters

i.e. in the decimal number 1932
1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,0 is the set
4 is the size

This can be calculated for any set by putting the size to the power of the number of characters in the set i.e.
4 bit binary = 4 numbers with 2 characters 2^4 = 16 values
3 bit decimal = 3 numbers with 10 characters 10^3 = 1000 values (0 - 999 = 1000 values)
3 bit hexadecimal = 3 numbers with 16 characters 16^3 = 4096 values

Anyway you get the picture, but like I said we merely use the most logical methods for calculation reasons and also for communicating with other people.

In the TMA01 there was a bit about binary and it was easy to do so I obviously have now managed to get it to sink in. (stupidly easy) So now that I have been given the chance to answer a question and know that I understood it I Am feeling alot happier, the comments here have been a great help and I did make notes from what both of you have said, so maybe when someone else comes in and sees the topic it might help them too...unless of course I am the only one who was new to binary.

Thanks again

Kerensa

I doubt that, there are people from all ranges here so should be useful for someone

By the way hexadecimal is obviously used because it is the range of 4 binary bits
i.e. 4 bit binary = 1 bit hexadecimal, there is no conversion at any range to a decimal and binary is harder to work with as there is only 2 possibilities.
Therefore they use hexadecimal as it is easier to work with and is simply the value of 4 bits (binary)