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Dave W.
Info Junkie
USA
26020 Posts |
 Posted - 06/22/2006 : 21:12:11
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Computers these days work with binary. Each of the bazillions switches in the computer you're using right now are either "on" or "off," hence the "bi" in "binary." And even though your calculator and spreadsheets and other applications typically show numbers with ten different possible digits - zero through nine, or decimal - internally to the computer they're just a bunch of binary digits. In fact, it takes about four binary digits to represent a single decimal digit, since a decimal 9 is written in binary as 1001.
Now, I understand the reason typically offered for why this is. Inside the computer's hardware, a binary zero is typically represented by a voltage close to ground, while a binary one is typically a voltage near the supply voltage (used to be five volts, but with the advent of laptops and other low-power applications, can be as low as three, so far as I know). And while creating a computer that actually functioned in decimal - requiring ten different voltage levels to be stored and manipulated - would be a daunting task, a trinary computer based on a bipolar power supply (with a negative voltage, a ground, and a positive voltage) wouldn't be all that difficult, and would actually save us some digits compared to binary (a decimal 9 is written as 100 in trinary).
But I've discovered the real reason why we don't have trinary computers. You see, the smallest piece of information in a binary computer is a "bit," which is short for "Binary Digit." So of course, the shorthand for the smallest piece of information in a computer based upon the Trinary Digit would be a...
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- Dave W. (Private Msg, EMail)
Evidently, I rock!
Why not question something for a change?
Visit Dave's Psoriasis Info, too. |
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Kil
Evil Skeptic
USA
13476 Posts |
Posted - 06/22/2006 : 21:25:34 [Permalink]
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| Dave, go to your room... |
Uncertainty may make you uncomfortable. Certainty makes you ridiculous.
Why not question something for a change?
Genetic Literacy Project |
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Ricky
SFN Die Hard
USA
4907 Posts |
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HalfMooner
Dingaling
Philippines
15831 Posts |
Posted - 06/22/2006 : 21:59:24 [Permalink]
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This'll teach me to check what forum a posting is in, before I read it.
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“Biology is just physics that has begun to smell bad.” —HalfMooner
Here's a link to Moonscape News, and one to its Archive. |
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Hawks
SFN Regular
Canada
1383 Posts |
Posted - 06/23/2006 : 00:29:43 [Permalink]
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| Shouldn't that really be a Sept/Hex hybrid? |
METHINKS IT IS LIKE A WEASEL
It's a small, off-duty czechoslovakian traffic warden! |
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Dave W.
Info Junkie
USA
26020 Posts |
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Topic Locked
