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An introduction to the terms bit, byte, and some common prefixes used for larger values.
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Definitions
- Bit - smallest unit of data or information
- Byte - commonly consists of 8 bits
- Kilobyte - one thousand (1,000) bytes
- Megabyte - one million (1,000,000) bytes
- Gigabyte - one billion (1,000,000,000) bytes
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Welcome, in this video, I will introduce
you to the terms bit and byte.
0:00
We will then identify some common
prefixes used for larger values and
0:06
what they mean to you.
0:10
You may have a mobile phone or a digital
camera that uses very small storage cards.
0:13
This is called a microSD card, and
it's small enough to fit on your thumb.
0:18
Ten years ago,
you can purchase one of these cards and
0:23
you can take hundreds of high resolution
photographs before running out of space.
0:26
Today, you can buy a thumb sized card and
take hundreds of thousands of photographs.
0:32
How is this possible?
0:38
To start, let's get a better
understanding of bits and bytes.
0:40
A bit is the smallest unit of data or
information.
0:47
It is short for binary digit,
which means it is either one or zero.
0:52
You can think of this as a light
switch in the on or off position or
0:57
the answer to a yes no question as true or
false.
1:02
A byte commonly consists of 8 bits.
1:07
Historically, it was used to store
a single character like the letter R or
1:12
the number 7.
1:18
We usually refer to a file
size in terms of bytes.
1:19
For example,
this Python icon is 559 bytes.
1:24
My resume stored as a word
processing file is 26,000 bytes.
1:30
The movie Hidden Figures
stored on a Blu-ray disk is
1:36
more than 39 billion bytes.
1:41
There is a better way to refer to
these large numbers by using different
1:44
prefixes before the word byte.
1:49
For example, kilo means 1,000 or
1 followed by three 0s.
1:51
You may have heard of kilo before.
1:58
A kilogram means 1,000 grams.
2:00
A kilometer or
kilometer means 1,000 meters.
2:03
So instead of 26,000 bytes, I would
say that my resume is 26 kilobytes.
2:08
Mega means 1 million or
1 followed by six 0s.
2:15
My favorite song stored on a portable
music player is 4.7 megabytes.
2:20
Giga means 1 billion, or
1 followed by nine 0s.
2:27
A DVD of Hidden Figures
is 39.26 gigabytes.
2:33
There are more prefixes for
even larger values.
2:39
The largest widely
recognized prefix is yotta.
2:43
A yottabyte is 1 septillion bytes,
or 1 followed by 24 0s.
2:47
This is about 45 trillion
Blu-ray movie disks or
2:54
1,000 years of worldwide Internet traffic.
2:58
To house 1 yottabyte of data,
3:02
you would need a data center roughly
the size of the state of Connecticut.
3:03
Back to that microSD card for your phone.
3:09
Today, you can buy a 256 gigabyte card for
the same price
3:11
you would have paid for
a 256 megabyte card ten years ago.
3:16
The difference is the card you buy today
stores 1,000 times the amount of data.
3:21
In the next video, we will discuss the
different types of data you will use when
3:27
writing computer programs.
3:31
Stay tuned.
3:33
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