CS101 Lecture 11:

Number Systems
and Binary Numbers

Aaron Stevens
14 February 2011

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!!! MATH WARNING !!!

TODAY’S LECTURE CONTAINS TRACE
AMOUNTS OF
ARITHMETIC AND ALGEBRA

PLEASE BE ADVISED THAT CALCULTORS

WILL BE ALLOWED ON THE QUIZ
(and that you probably won’t need them)

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 Overview/Questions
– What gives a number its value?
– What is a number system?
– I’ve heard that computers use binary
numbers. What’s a binary number?
– What kind of numbers do computers store
and manipulate?

Numbers
Natural Numbers
Zero and any number obtained by repeatedly adding
one to it.

Examples: 100, 0, 45645, 32

Negative Numbers
A value less than 0, with a – sign

Examples: -24, -1, -45645, -32

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 Numbers

Integers
A natural number, a negative number, zero

Examples: 249, 0, -45645, -32

Rational Numbers
An integer or the quotient of two integers

Examples: -249, -1, 0, 3/7, -2/5

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Numbering Systems
A numbering system assigns meaning to the
position of the numeric symbols.

For example, consider this set of symbols:

642

What number is it? Why?

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 Numbering Systems
It depends on the numbering system.

642 is 600 + 40 + 2 in BASE 10

The base of a number determines the number

of digits (e.g. symbols) and the value of digit
positions

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Positional Notation
Continuing with our example…
642 in base 10 positional notation is:

6 x 102 = 6 x 100 = 600

+ 4 x 101 = 4 x 10 = 40
+ 2 x 10º = 2 x 1 = 2 = 642 in base 10

This number is in The power indicates

base 10 the position of
the number
10
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 Positional Notation
642 = 63 * 102 + 42 * 101 + 21 * 100

B is the base
As a general form:

dn * Bn-1 + dn-1 * Bn-2 + ... + d1 * B 0

n is the number of d is the digit in the

digits in the number ith position
in the number
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What Would Pooh Do?

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 Binary Numbers
Digital computers are made up of electronic
circuits, which have exactly 2 states: on and off.

Computers use a numbering system which

has exactly 2 symbols, representing on and off.

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Binary Numbers
Decimal is base 10 and has 10 digits:
0,1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9

Binary is base 2 and has 2, so we use only 2

symbols:
0,1

For a given base, valid numbers will only contain the digits in that
base, which range from 0 up to (but not including) the base. 14
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 Binary Numbers and
Computers
A binary digit or bit can take on only these two
values.

Low Voltage = 0
High Voltage = 1 all bits have 0 or 1

Binary numbers are built by concatenating a

string of bits together.
Example: 10101010

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Positional Notation: Binary Numbers

Recall this general form:
dn * Bn-1 + dn-1 * Bn-2 + ... + d1 * B0

The same can be applied to base-2 numbers:

1011bin = 1 * 23 + 0 * 22 + 1 * 21 + 1 * 20
1011bin = (1 * 8) + (0 * 4) + (1 * 2) + (1 * 1)

1011bin = 8 + 0 + 2 + 1 = 11dec
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 Converting Binary to Decimal
What is the decimal equivalent of the binary
number 01101110?

(you try it! Work left-to-right)

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Converting Binary to Decimal

What is the decimal equivalent of the binary
number 01101110?
0 x 27 = 0 x 128 = 0
+ 1 x 26 = 1 x 64 = 64
+ 1 x 25 = 1 x 32 = 32
+ 0 x 24 = 0 x 16 = 0
+ 1 x 23 = 1x8 =8
+ 1 x 22 = 1x4 =4
+ 1 x 21 = 1x2 =2
+ 0 x 2º = 0x1 =0
= 110 (decimal)
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 Converting Binary to Decimal
Try another one. What is the decimal
equivalent of the binary number 10101011?

(you try it! Work left-to-right)

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Converting Binary to Decimal

Try another one. What is the decimal
equivalent of the binary number 10101011?
1 x 27 = 1 x 128 = 128
+ 0 x 26 = 0 x 64 = 0
+ 1 x 25 = 1 x 32 = 32
+ 0 x 24 = 0 x 16 = 0
+ 1 x 23 = 1x8 =8
+ 0 x 22 = 0x4 =0
+ 1 x 21 = 1x2 =2
+ 1 x 2º = 1x1 =1
= 171 (decimal)
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 Converting from Decimal
to Other Bases
Algorithm (process) for converting number
in base 10 to other bases

While (the quotient is not zero)

Divide the decimal number by the new base*
Make the remainder the next digit to the left in the answer
Replace the original decimal number with the quotient

* Using whole number (integer) division only.

Example: 3 / 2 gives us a quotient of 1 and a remainder 1 21
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Converting Decimal to Binary

What is the binary equivalent of the decimal number
103?

103 / 2 = 51, remainder 1  rightmost bit

51 / 2 = 25, remainder 1
25 / 2 = 12, remainder 1
12 / 2 = 6, remainder 0
6 / 2 = 3, remainder 0
3 / 2 = 1, remainder 1
1 / 2 = 0, remainder 1 leftmost bit
103dec = 1 1 0 0 1 1 1bin
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 Converting Decimal to Binary
Now you try one. What is the binary
equivalent of the decimal number 201?

Recall the algorithm:

While (the quotient is not zero)
Divide the decimal number by the new base*
Make the remainder the next digit to the left in the answer
Replace the original decimal number with the quotient

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Converting Decimal to Binary

What is the binary equivalent of the decimal number 201?

201 / 2 = 100, remainder 1  rightmost bit

100 / 2 = 50, remainder 0
50 / 2 = 25, remainder 0
25 / 2 = 12, remainder 1
12 / 2 = 6, remainder 0
6 / 2 = 3, remainder 0
3 / 2 = 1, remainder 1
1 / 2 = 0, remainder 1 leftmost bit

201dec = 1 1 0 0 1 0 0 1bin

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 Binary and Computers
Byte
8 bits – a common unit of computer memory.

Word
A computer word is a group of bits which are passed
around together during computation.
The word length of the computer’s processor is how many
bits are grouped together.
• 8-bit machine (e.g. Nintendo Gameboy, 1989)
• 16-bit machine (e.g. Sega Genesis, 1989)
• 32-bit machines (e.g. Sony PlayStation, 1994)
• 64-bit machines (e.g. Nintendo 64, 1996)
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Just Call Me!

Here’s my phone number:
000101101111111110010110010000011001

What’s wrong with this number?

– Hard to write on a napkin
– Vulnerable to transcription errors
– Won’t make you popular at parties

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 Binary, Hexadecimal, Decimal
Each four bits
map to a hex digit.
Hexadecimal
prefix 0x????
No inherent value, just
means “treat as a hex
number”

0x94D3

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Hexadecimal to Decimal
Convert each hex digit into 4 bits.
Convert binary to decimal.

Example:
0x94D3
= 1001 0100 1101 0011
= 215 + 212 + 210 + 27 + 26 + 24 +
21 + 20
= 32768 + 4096 + 1024 + 128 +
64 + 16 + 2 + 1

= 38099 (decimal)
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 Conversions Between
Number Systems
Try some!
http://www.mathsisfun.com/binary-decimal-
hexadecimal-converter.html

My phone number:
0x16FF96419
(or:
0001 0110 1111 1111 1001 0110 0100 0001 1001)

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 What You Learned Today
– Encoding: Symbols Represent Values
– Number Systems
– Binary Numbers, Bits, and Bytes
– Algorithms: converting binary to decimal
and vice versa
– Encoding: Hexadecimal

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Announcements and To Do List

–HW04 due Wednesday 2/16

–Readings:
• Reed ch 5, pp 83-87, 89-90 (today)
– Quiz 2 on Friday 2/18
• Covers lectures 6,7,9,10,11

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 Want to learn more?
If you’ve read this far, maybe you’d like to
learn about other binary representations of
other types of numbers?

Read about this on Wikipedia and we can

discuss your questions:
– Two’s complement (negative numbers)
– IEE754 (real numbers)

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