Skip to content

Fix binary representation phrasing in 10 + 7 example #117

New issue

Have a question about this project? Sign up for a free GitHub account to open an issue and contact its maintainers and the community.

Sign up for GitHub

By clicking “Sign up for GitHub”, you agree to our terms of service and privacy statement. We’ll occasionally send you account related emails.

Already on GitHub? Sign in to your account

Open
iwasnevergivenaname wants to merge 1 commit into
base: main
Choose a base branch
from
Open

Fix binary representation phrasing in 10 + 7 example #117

Changes from all commits
Commits
Show all changes
1 commit
Select commit
File filter

Filter by extension

Filter by extension
Conversations
Failed to load comments.
Loading
Jump to
Jump to file
Failed to load files.
Loading
Diff view
Diff view
6 changes: 3 additions & 3 deletions content/number-rep/integer-representations.md
View file
Open in desktop
Original file line number Diff line number Diff line change
Expand Up @@ -46,9 +46,9 @@ This representation is supported in C (discussed more later). Built-in types lik

:::{caution} How many bits do we need for a system that supports $10 + 7$?

* 10 in binary is `1010`. 4 bits.
* 7 in binary is `0111`. 4 bits.
* 17 in binary is `10001`. **5 bits**.
* 10 as a 4-bit unsigned integer is `1010`.
* 7 as a 4-bit unsigned integer is `0111`.
* 17 requires a **5-bit** unsigned integer container: `10001`.

If we used a 4-bit unsigned integer representation, we wouldn't have enough room to represent the number 17. Instead, our "binary odometer" would truncate the result, cropping off the leftmost `1` and storing `0001`. So binary addition with 4-bit unsigned integers would imply that $10 + 7 = 1$...?!

Expand Down