2014-04-26 10:52:28 -04:00
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bit
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2014-04-26 11:54:15 -04:00
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n. [from the mainstream meaning and Binary digIT ] 1. [techspeak] The unit
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of information; the amount of information obtained from knowing the answer
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to a yes-or-no question for which the two outcomes are equally probable. 2.
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[techspeak] A computational quantity that can take on one of two values,
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such as true and false or 0 and 1. 3. A mental flag: a reminder that
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something should be done eventually. I have a bit set for you. (I haven't
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seen you for a while, and I'm supposed to tell or ask you something.) 4.
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More generally, a (possibly incorrect) mental state of belief. I have a bit
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set that says that you were the last guy to hack on EMACS. (Meaning I think
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you were the last guy to hack on EMACS, and what I am about to say is
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predicated on this, so please stop me if this isn't true. ) I just need one
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bit from you is a polite way of indicating that you intend only a short
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interruption for a question that can presumably be answered yes or no. A bit
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is said to be set if its value is true or 1, and reset or clear if its value
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is false or 0. One speaks of setting and clearing bits. To toggle or invert
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a bit is to change it, either from 0 to 1 or from 1 to 0. See also flag ,
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trit , mode bit. The term bit first appeared in print in the
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computer-science sense in a 1948 paper by information theorist Claude
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Shannon, and was there credited to the early computer scientist John Tukey
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(who also seems to have coined the term software ). Tukey records that bit
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evolved over a lunch table as a handier alternative to bigit or binit , at a
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conference in the winter of 1943-44.
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