Representing Information

• Simplest way
- Unary representation
• For example, 4 ~ 1111
• Obvious Problem
- cumbersome when working with large
numbers.
• Also studied, Roman Numerals
 Types of Number Systems
A number system defines how a number can be
represented using distinct symbols.
Categorized into two groups:
positional
& non-positional systems.
In a positional number system
each symbol represents different value
depending on the position they occupy in a
number.
Example
Decimal, Binary, Hexadecimal & Octal
1/15/2020
 Types of Number Systems
In non-positional number system
each symbol represents the same
value regardless of its position
Example : Unary
Question
What About Roman Numerals?
- Hybrid of Positional & Non-positional
Why?
Look at IX, XI, XII
 Decimal Number System
• Till now, comfortable working with 0,1,2,…,9
• Referred as decimal numbers
– Ten symbols: 0,1, ….9
– Operations are systematic – i.e. algorithmic
• Implementation issues:
– Hard to store
• ENIAC (First electronic computer) used 10 vacuum tubes / digit
– Hard to transmit
• Need high precision to encode 10 signal levels on single wire
– Messy to implement digital logic functions
Addition, multiplication, etc.
1/15/2020
 Binary system

We know that computer is made up of

large collection of electronic devices.

These devices react to presence or

absence of voltages.
 Two conditions
Easy to recognize two conditions:
1. Presence of a voltage – we’ll call this
state “1” or logic “1” or ON/TRUE state
2. Absence of a voltage – we’ll call this state
“0” or logic “0” or OFF/FALSE state
0 1 0
3.3V
2.8V

0.5V
1/15/2020 6
0.0V
 Bits & Data Types
• Symbolically we represent –
- presence of voltage as ‘1’
- absence of voltage as ‘0’
• Each 0 & each 1 is referred to as a bit.
• Bit – short form for binary digit.
 Binary Number System
• Two digits: 0,1 MSB
 Positional number system
• A nibble is 4 bits
• A byte is 8 bits
LSB
• A word is 32 bits or 4 bytes
• Long word = 8 bytes = 64 bits
• Quad word = 16 bytes = 128 bits
• Programming languages use these
standard number of bits when organizing
data storage and access.
1/15/2020 8
 Bits
• Important
- to be able to identify uniquely a large
number of distinct values.
• Voltage on one wire can represent
uniquely one of only two things.
• To identify many things
- necessary to combine bits
 Bits & Data Types
• If we use eight bits
(corresponding to the voltage present
on eight wires)
• We can uniquely identify at most
- 2^8 (256) numbers
• In general, with k bits
- at most 2^k things can be uniquely
identified.
 Data Types
• Once we represent information
Important
- How to operate on it?
- A representation is a data type
if there are operations in the computer
that can operate on information
encoded in that representation.
 Data Types
Two important Data Types
- Representing numbers
- Representing characters
• Unsigned Integers
• We know
12 = 0.2^4 + 1.2^3 + 1.2^2 + 0.2^1 + 1.2^0
~ 01100
 Integer Data Types
Important, with k bits
- 0 to 2^k – 1 integers can be
represented.
• For example, with 5 bits
- we can represent integers from 0 to 31.
- Unsigned Integers
 Signed Integers
• Consider 5 bit code
- we know 32 things can be uniquely
identified.
• We can choose to represent
- positive integers from 1 to 15
- negative integers from -1 to -15
We still have two 5-bit codes unassigned.
Important: 0 ~ 00000
 Signed Magnitude
• Observe
0 to 15 (0 to 2^(k-1)-1) have leading 0.
• i.e., positive integers have 0 as a
leading bit.
• For representing negative integers
- put leading bit 1 instead of 0
• Now, 12 ~ 01100,
So -12 ~ 11100
Note: MSB is used to indicate the sign
That leaves two values: one for 0
 Signed Integers Cont…
Example: 3 bits
Signed
Magnitude
000 +0
001 +1
010 +2
011 +3
100 -0
101 -1
110 -2
111 -3

1/15/2020 16
 Limitations of SM
Problems with sign-magnitude representation!
- Two representations of zero (+0 and –0)
- Arithmetic circuits are complex to
implement (hardware complexity is more)
- Unexpected results
(if we perform arithmetic operations)
Example : Try 2 + (-1)
010
+ 101
1/15/2020
111 = - 3 ???
17
 1’s complement
• A negative number is represented by
- taking the representation of positive
number having the same magnitude
& ‘flipping’ all the bits.
• For example, 12 ~ 01100 so,
-12 ~ 10011
• Observe,
0 and - 0 has different representations
This representation was used in some early
computers
 Contd…
1’s
Signed
b2b1b0 Complemen
Magnitude
t
000 +0 +0
001 +1 +1
010 +2 +2
011 +3 +3
100 -0 -3
101 -1 -2
110 -2 -1
19
111 -3 -0