What does byte store?

What does byte store?

• A. Decimal numbers.
• B. Logical values.
• C. A single character.
• D. Small Whole Numbers.

Answer: (D)

A byte stores data as 8 bits, which gives 256 different patterns. Those patterns are most naturally used to represent small integers, so a byte is best described as storing small whole numbers. While it can also encode a character in ASCII or hold a boolean value in practice, the general and most common role of a byte is to represent small integer values. Decimal numbers (with fractions) require larger or different representations, and a character isn’t the universal use of a byte across all encodings, so small whole numbers is the most fitting description.

A byte stores data as 8 bits, which gives 256 different patterns. Those patterns are most naturally used to represent small integers, so a byte is best described as storing small whole numbers. While it can also encode a character in ASCII or hold a boolean value in practice, the general and most common role of a byte is to represent small integer values. Decimal numbers (with fractions) require larger or different representations, and a character isn’t the universal use of a byte across all encodings, so small whole numbers is the most fitting description.