CS notes
CS notes
Character Sets
What is a Character Set?
A character set is a collection of characters (letters, numbers, symbols) that a
computer can understand and represent using binary (0s and 1s). Every
character has a unique binary code.
Types of Character Sets
1. ASCII (American Standard Code for Information Interchange)
o Uses 7 bits (can represent 128 characters).
o Includes English letters (A-Z, a-z), digits (0-9), and some symbols (!,
@, #, etc.).
o Cannot store characters from other languages like Chinese or
Arabic.
2. Extended ASCII
o Uses 8 bits (can represent 256 characters).
3. UNICODE
o Uses 16 bits or more (can represent 65,536 characters or
more).
o Covers almost every language, including Chinese, Arabic, and
emojis.
o Uses more storage than ASCII but is more versatile.
Representing Sound
How is Sound Stored in a Computer?
1. Sound is analog (continuous waves) and must be converted into digital
form for a computer to understand it.
2. This conversion is done through sampling, where the sound wave is
measured at regular intervals and stored as binary data.
3. The process is called Analog-to-Digital Conversion (A2D).
Key Concepts in Sound Storage
1. Sample Rate (Measured in Hertz, Hz)
o The number of times per second a sound wave is measured.
Representing Images
How Do Computers Store Images?
1. Images are made up of tiny squares called pixels.
2. Each pixel has a binary code that represents its color.
3. The more pixels in an image, the better the quality, but also the
larger the file size.
Key Concepts in Image Representation
1. Resolution (Image Quality)
o The number of pixels in an image.
o Example: An image with 1920 × 1080 pixels (Full HD) has
2,073,600 pixels.
o Higher resolution = more detail but larger file size.
o Examples:
Worked Examples
1. What is a Pixel?
o A pixel is the smallest unit of a digital image.
Final Thoughts
ASCII is limited to English; UNICODE supports all languages.
Higher sample rate and bit depth = better sound but bigger files.
Higher resolution and colour depth = better images but more
storage needed.
Would you like an even simpler version or is this detailed enough? 😊