Local Area High Speed Networks

Binary, Decimal, and Hexadecimal Characters

The normal mathematical order for a string of binary bits is to place the most significant bit on the far-left end of the string. (This sometimes is big-endian order)[1903]>called big-endian order.)

A string of 8 binary bits is converted to a pair of hexadecimal characters by breaking the byte into two 4-bit groups (called nibbles) and converting each to a hexadecimal symbol in the range 0-F. For example:

Binary 1 1 0 0 = 8(1) + 4(1) + 2(0) + 1(0) = 12 = X'C

Binary 0 0 1 0 = 8(0) + 4(0) + 2(1) + 1(0) = 2 = X'2

Hence:

Binary 1 1 0 0 0 0 1 0 = X'C2

Table B.1 displays the mapping between sets of 4 binary bits, their decimal value, and their hexadecimal representation.

Table B.1. Binary, Decimal, and ...