Binary code Binary code A binary code represents text, computer processor instructions, or any other data using a two-symbol system. The two-symbol system used is often the binary number system's 0 and 1. The binary code assigns a pattern of binary digits, also known as bits, to each character, instruction, etc. For example, a binary string of eight bits can represent any of 256 possible values and can, therefore, represent a wide variety of different items. In computing and telecommunications, binary codes are used for various methods of encoding data, such as character strings, into bit strings. Those methods may use fixed-width
Computer number format sixteen values, a nibble is sometimes known as a hexadecimal digit. Octal and hex are convenient ways to represent binary numbers, as used by computers. Computer engineers often need to write out binary quantities, but in practice writing out a binary number such as 1001001101010001 is tedious and prone to errors. Therefore, binary quantities are written in a base-8, or "octal", or, much more commonly, a base-16, "hexadecimal" or "hex", number format. In the decimal system, there are 10 digits, 0 through 9, which combine to form numbers. In an octal system, there are only 8 digits, 0 through 7.