The Binary System
For a computer to do its work, every piece of information given to it must be translated into binary code. You are probably used to using 10 digits, 0 through 9, when you do arithmetic. When the computer uses the binary code, it uses only two digits, 0 and 1. Think of it as sending messages to the computer by switching a light on and off.
Each 0 or 1 digit is called a bit, and most computers use a sequence of 8 bits (called a byte) for each piece of data. Almost all computers use the same code, called ASCII (pronounced "askey"), to stand for letters of the alphabet, number digits, punctuation, and other special characters that control the computer's operation. Below is a list of ASCII bytes for the alphabet.
A: 01000001
B: 01000010
C: 01000011
D: 01000100
E: 01000101
F: 01000110
G: 01000111
H: 01001000
I: 01001001
J: 01001010
K: 01001011
L: 01001100
M: 01001101
N: 01001110
O: 01001111
P: 01010000
Q: 01010001
R: 01010010
S: 01010011
T: 01010100
U: 01010101
V: 01010110
W: 01010111
X: 01011000
Y: 01011001
Z: 01011010
Computadoras e Internet: El sistema binario (Spanish Version)