Binary Code - Technical Support Fundamentals from Grow with Google #10

Key Takeaways

you might be wondering how our computers get these ones and zeros it's a great question imagine we have a light bulb and a switch that turns the state of the light on or off if we turn the light on we can denote that state as one if the light bulb is off we can represent the state of zero now imagine eight light bulbs and switches that represents eight bits with a state of zero or one let's backtrack to the punch cards that were used in jacquard loom remember that the loom used cards with holes in them when the loom would reach a hole it would hook to thread underneath meaning that the loom was on if there wasn't a hole it would not hook the thread so it was off this is a foundational binary concept by utilizing the two states of on or off jacquard was able to weave intricate patterns into fabric with his looms then the industry started refining the punch cards a little more if there was a hole the computer would read one if there wasn't a hole it would read zero then by just translating the combination of zeros and ones a computer could calculate any possible amount of numbers binary in today's computer isn't done by reading holes it uses electricity via n transistors allowing electrical signals to pass through if there's an electric voltage we would denote it as one if there isn't we would denote it by zero but just having transistors isn't enough for our computer to be able to do complex tasks imagine if you had two light switches on opposite ends of a room each controlling a light in the room what if when you went to turn on the light with one switch the other switch wouldn't turn off that would be a very poorly design room both switches should either turn the light on or off depending on the state of the light fortunately we have something known as logic gates logic gates allow our transistors to do more complex tasks like decide where to send electrical signals depending on logical conditions there are lots of different types of logic gates but we won't discuss them in detail here if you're curious about the role that transistors and logic gates play in modern circuitry you can read more about it in the supplementary reading now we know how our computer gets its ones and zeros to calculate into meaningful instructions later in this course we'll be able to talk about how we're able to turn human readable instructions into zeros in one our computer understands through compilers that's one of the very basic building blocks of programming that's led to the creation of our favorite social media sites video games and just about everything else and I'm super excited to teach you how to count in binary that's up next