Common Uses
The byte is also defined as a data type in certain programming languages. The C and C++ programming languages, for example, define byte as an "addressable unit of data storage large enough to hold any member of the basic character set of the execution environment" (clause 3.6 of the C standard). The C standard requires that the char integral data type is capable of holding at least 256 different values, and is represented by at least 8 bits (clause 5.2.4.2.1). Various implementations of C and C++ reserve 8, 9, 16, 32, or 36 bits for the storage of a byte. The actual number of bits in a particular implementation is documented as CHAR_BIT as implemented in the limits.h file. Java's primitive byte data type is always defined as consisting of 8 bits and being a signed data type, holding values from −128 to 127. The C# programming language, along with other .NET-languages, has both the unsigned byte (named byte) and the signed byte (named sbyte), holding values from 0 to 255 and -128 to 127, respectively.
In data transmission systems a byte is defined as a contiguous sequence of binary bits in a serial data stream, such as in modem or satellite communications, which is the smallest meaningful unit of data. These bytes might include start bits, stop bits, or parity bits, and thus could vary from 7 to 12 bits to contain a single 7-bit ASCII code.
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Famous quotes containing the word common:
“To complain of the age we live in, to murmur at the present possessors of power, to lament the past, to conceive extravagant hopes of the future, are the common dispositions of the greatest part of mankind.”
—Edmund Burke (1729–1797)
“What had really caused the women’s movement was the additional years of human life. At the turn of the century women’s life expectancy was forty-six; now it was nearly eighty. Our groping sense that we couldn’t live all those years in terms of motherhood alone was “the problem that had no name.” Realizing that it was not some freakish personal fault but our common problem as women had enabled us to take the first steps to change our lives.”
—Betty Friedan (20th century)