Character (computing) of the “basic execution character set” and (in newer C standards) UTF-8 code units which implies a minimum size of 8 bits. The exact number of bits can be checked via codice_2 macro. By far the most common size is 8 bits, and the POSIX standard "requires" it to be 8 bits. Since Unicode requires at least 21 bits to store a single code point, it is usually impossible to store one inside a single codice_1; instead a variable-length encoding such as UTF-8 must be used. Unfortunately, the fact that a character was historically stored in a single byte led
Reliable byte stream Reliable byte stream A reliable byte stream is a common service paradigm in computer networking; it refers to a byte stream in which the bytes which emerge from the communication channel at the recipient are exactly the same, and in exactly the same order, as they were when the sender inserted them into the channel. The classic example of a reliable byte stream communication protocol is the Transmission Control Protocol, one of the major building blocks of the Internet. A reliable byte stream is not the only reliable service paradigm which computer network communication protocols provide, however; other protocols (e.g.