How does a computer recognize binary code?

Question

I understand that a programming language converts command into binary that the computer can understand, and that one binary number represents one bit and since 8 bits is a byte that makes one character, but what I don't understand is how does the proccessor understand binary in the first place? How does the computer when you get down to it, understand what to do when you just say, on off on on off... etc.

I'm sorry, I think you are misunderstanding my question... I know that a program coverts information into data then gets converted back into information, but going deep into the computer, if I press A and it shows 01000001 to the CPU and the CPU displays A on the monitor, but how does the CPU recognize 01000001 as A and going deeper how does the CPU recognize binary in the first place?

Answer 1

This is the way to really get to grips with a computer!

It is all done by building electronic circuits which you can apply a set of binary inputs to (i.e. it may have two, or eight, or 32 input terminals), and get a different set of binary outputs from (maybe more, or less, or the same number). Then the outputs can be split up and sent around to different circuits as the inputs, and out come some different binary outputs again. The circuits don't "understand" anything, they just do what they were built for. It is the circuit designer who understands the precise way in which the output is USEFULLY related to the input.

Maurice Wilkes completed the EDSAC, the first fully working computer in the world, at Cambridge, UK in May 1949. It was about eighteen months before a second computer, SWAC in the USA, was operational. Of course everybody wanted to know how the EDSAC worked, and he wrote it up in a FOUR-PAGE article for the monthly "Journal of Scientific Instruments". It shows the circuit diagrams of the key elements, and describes how the binary instruction stream is sequentially fetched and made to trigger changes in the stored data. If you read this article, you will be amazed that the basic principles have hardly changed in 60 years. Of course John von Neumann of IAS Princeton should get more of the credit, because the elegance and simplicity is in his design, but Wilkes was better at putting it into practice.

Answer 2

I'll try to answer:

You already know what binary is. At a high level, think about the programs running the computer. Windows says when certain commands are issued (bytes sent to the cpu), the computer will act one way. Mac says a different thing. Linux says something different also. The CPU simply processes the info and sends it where it needs to go. For example, you hit a key on your keyboard. The cursor is flashing at a dos prompt. You hit 'A' and it comes up on your screen. The CPU was waiting for input from your keyboard. You sent 'A' which could be (01010110) <--made up. The cpu says there is an 'A' here, I'll send it to the screen and the DOS program. If you hit 'Enter' next, the keyboard sends (10010101) <--made up too. The CPU sends that to the screen and to the DOS program. DOS responsd back to the CPU with it's own instructions. The CPU sends that to the screen also.

You also have to think of the many input devices and output devices that affect computing. Many years ago, it was just a keyboard. Later the mouse was introduced. You always had a disk drive also. Output included screens and printers. It's hard to sum up in one answer but check the link below.

Answer 3

Give you an example. Say somewhere in your memory, there are three bytes of data:

1: 0000 0101
2: 0000 0100
3: 0000 0010

Say address 1 (0000 0101) happen to be an instruction that adds the integers from the next two bytes together. So, when the computer fetches this byte into the CPU (central processing unit, i.e. the Pentium chip in your PC), it triggers certain circuits to star perform addition. Then, the CPU fetches 0000 0100, which is number 4 in decimal, and fetches 0000 0010, which is 2 in decimal. Adding these two integers together becomes 0000 0110, which is 6.

The CPU may continue to fetch address 4 in the memory for the next instruction. There are instructions telling CPU to subtract, multiply, or divide. There are other instructions ask it to compare values, skip to a different address, etc. All these instructions combined together may perform a useful task, like allowing you to write a document or browse the web. The person who do the job of putting these instructions together is called a programmer.

Answer 4

To continue what First L said, at any time there is a specific place (address) in memory that the computer is reading from to execute these instructions... So if the program is at address 500 and it finds a byte sequence which means read an integer into Register EAX from address 10000, it will process that instruction and go on to the next address to see what the next instruction is. What I've told you is not 100% true in modern machines (or even many computers built in the past 20 years) but its close enough to get you the idea.

Answer 5

CPU is a logic device that has combined several different circuitry to decode instructions ( binary codes ).

Every CPU has a fixed set of instructions set. That is the fundamental more basic rules that the CPU knows. That is the only language the CPU understands. And programmers must translate everything into the these sets of instruction sets other wise the CPU will not do anything.

Each instruction set is a set of binary numbers. If you give this CPU that instruction, it will only do one thing that it is set to do.

Answer 6

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microcode

Answer 7

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