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Binary Information and Representation: Bits, Bytes, Nibbles, Octets and Characters
(Page 3 of 3)
Byte versus Octet
There has been some disagreement,
and even controversy, surrounding the use of the words byte and
octet. The former term has traditionally been the most popular
in common parlance for a set of eight bits, especially in North America.
However, it is technically not the correct term.
A byte is, formally, the smallest
unit of data that can be read from or written to at one time in a computer
system. In almost all cases today, that is indeed eight bits, but there
are have been some systems where a byte was not eight bits. Some older
36-bit computers used 9-bit bytes, and there were also systems that
had byte sizes of 6 or 7 bits, or even variable-sized bytes. For this
reason, many people, especially techie professionals, prefer the term
octet, which clearly and unambiguously implies eight.
This term is much more common outside North America.
This matter of octets and
bytes is another of the little tempests in tea pots
that computer people seem to love so much. The bottom line in modern
computer systems, however, is that an octet is a byte and a byte in
an octet, and the terms can be used interchangeably without too much
danger. You will more often see octets used in technical standards.
In this Guide, I use the term bytes for a simple reason: it is the term
that most people are familiar with, including myself (though bear in
mind that I live in North America; if I were European I might have rather
different views on this!)
Key Concept: Formally, an octet is the correct term for exactly eight bits, while a byte is the smallest number of bits that can be accessed in a computer system, which may or may not equal eight. In practice, modern computers use 8-bit bytes, and the terms are used interchangeably (with byte being more common in North America, and octet often being preferred in Europe). |
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Version 3.0 - Version Date: September 20, 2005
© Copyright 2001-2005 Charles M. Kozierok. All Rights Reserved.
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