Octet (computing) Octet (computing) The octet is a unit of digital information in computing and telecommunications that consists of eight bits. The term is often used when the term byte might be ambiguous, as the byte has historically been used for storage units of a variety of sizes. The term "octad(e)" for eight bits is no longer common. A variable-length sequence of octets, as in Abstract Syntax Notation One (ASN.1), is referred to as an octet string. The international standard IEC 60027-2, chapter 3.8.2, states that a byte is an octet of bits. However, the unit byte has historically been platform-dependent and
Byte serving data. It is often used when a server does not know exactly how much data there will be in the total response, allowing the server to start sending data to the client straight away without having to buffer the response and determine the exact length before it begins sending it to the client. This improves latency and reduces memory requirements while preserving the ability to reuse the connection after the response is completed. Byte serving and chunking are compatible and can be used with or without the other. Byte serving Byte serving (other names: RFC 7233 says the client makes