A detailed look at the collective ways in which computer scientists can group data. It is required by all examination boards.
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Task 1.1 A Stress of Worksheets Where we learn some fun facts about collective nouns
Perform some research into collective nouns on the World Wide Web (HINT : Try Googling 'collective nouns').
Now download and complete worksheet 'Collective Nouns'.
The smallest unit of measurement in a computer system is the bit. Bit stands for Binary Digit. Look carefully at the following popup which describes the relationship between bits, nybbles, bytes and words.
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Task 2.1 Getting into groups
Where we learn about the basic groupings of data in computer science
Your teacher will ask you to get into groups of bits, nybbles, bytes and words. You will need to remember these terms during the course.
Make some notes from the popup and from the activity you have done in class which will help you to remember the key terms bit, byte, nybble and word.
Where did Bytes Come From? - Computerphile (11:30)
A quantity prefix comes before a basic unit of measure to indicate a multiple or fraction of a unit. In computer maths, science and computer science, we use quantity prefixes to indicate higher multiples or fractions of basic units.
Task 3.1 Worksheet Where we learn about the metric quantity prefixes
First, click on the popup and discuss it with your shoulder partner. It shows how we use words to describe quantities. The values in the green rows are the ones which you will hear about most often.
Where we learn how to convert data in one unit into another
Answer the following questions in full sentences in your notebooks or on paper.
Where we learn about binary quantity prefixes
Even though most computer scientists use these 'metric prefixes' to group together bytes, they often don't actually group them powers of 10 (denary). Since computer scientists work in base 2 (binary), they group in powers of 2. We chose the nearest base 2 quantity to the base 10 metric prefix, so, we still use the prefix kilo to mean 1024 when it actually means 1000. Go figure! 1 Kilobyte (kB) = 1000 bytes (B) in metric or 1024 bytes (B) in binary.
We should be using different names for the 'binary prefixes' (and indeed, most computer scientists do). Open up the popup and check out the unusual prefix names. Have you ever seen them before? Some of the numbers for the larger prefixes are very big - too big for your calculator. However, we can use Python to help - it's also a really good calculator! This diagram shows you how to perform simple mathematical operations using Python. Try these examples out in Python before you start the activity. Use Python as a calculator to work out the answers to the following questions. Write the answers in full sentences in your notebooks.
This is really important - write it down in your notebooks! Now!
You may also want to read a little more about the origin of the binary prefix values here.
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