Chapter 1
Hardware VS Software
Hardware is physical. Your mouse. Your computer screen. Your Printer. This is all harware.
Software is the insructions that get your harware to do the work. The computer uses hardware for four basic taks. Input, Output, Processing and Storage.
The computer is pretty much stupid. The only way to get it to work is if we break everything down. This is where software comes in. Software converts instructions for the physical components (hardware). This is done by two simple commands. On AND off.
On & Off
It sounds coplicated right. But its not. On & Off translated 1 & 0 to a computer. In computer programming. 1 is the presence of Voltage. 0 is the lack of Voltage. Now remember voltage is an elctromotive force. Simply meaning that 1 and 0's controls a computers actions altogether.
0 & 1
The technology of storing and reading only two states is called binary. The number system that uses two states is called, binary number system. Think of it as when you was taught to count.( 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 etc). That is how humans understand counting. The computer is taught to understand it in two forms. 1 and 0.
Grouping in the binary system is done in eights. 1 digit equa1s a bit. 8 digits equals a byte. 8 bits equal a byte. A computers calculations and counting uses the binary number system. Counting for a computer (binary code) goes simply like this. 0, 1, 10, 11, 100, 101 and so on. Thats how the computer counts, talks, reads, and everything.
When text is stored into a computer it is stored using 0's and 1's. For example the letter A is 0100 0001.
All letters and numbers are stored in a computer as a series of bits each represented in the computer as on and off.
