Jonathan A. Titus

Microcomputer Pioneer

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Lesson 2: Binary Number System

From the original article in Radio-Electronics
by Jonathan A. Titus
Before you attempt to understand the octal number system, you should understand the binary number system used extensively in computers. If you need to review the binary system, see Computer Architecture, by Caxton Foster, mentioned previously.

The Mark-8 is an 8-bit mini computer, and each of its eight bits can exist in only one of two possible states , 1 or 0. You have probably noticed in the Intel User's Manual that the instructions are extensively noted in straight binary format, such as 01 0 11 110 . This is an excellent way to become familiar with the instructions, but it leaves a great deal to be desired when communicating between programmers and computers. We have, therefore, decided to use the OCTAL numbering system to represent the program instructions and data as presented in this article.
Read More: Adobe Acrobat PDF FileMark-8 Construction.pdf, p.10 [2.54 MB]


To show a sample how binary notation may work, we developed a COMM BOARD for the ASCII code, which you can see on the left side of the home page.

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