Also...

[ssha]

Thanks to all of my math-geek and general-geek friends for their answers re: non-base 10 numeric systems!

I was confused by the alphanumic bits, though. Someone care to elucidate in language a two-year-old could grasp? Pretty please? I'll cook for you or something in return!

Comments

[kieferskunk]

I assume you're talking about hexadecimal, which goes 0123456789ABCDEF ? All that is is that you've got more unique numbers per spot than you have numerals to represent them, so you start using letters to represent the values greater than 9.

In Base-10, the digits go from 0-9. In hexadecimal, which is base-16, the numbers go from 0-15, but to make it so each digit doesn't take more than one space, digits greater than 9 need a single character, and the people who invented the system used A-F to represent 10-15.

Does that help answer your question? :)

[ssha]

It answers two questions, in fact! You must be psychic, too, because one of them was one I hadn't even asked yet!

I had heard the terms 'hexidecimal' and 'hex' (the shortform reference) frequently in my life, having geeks for family and friends by-and-large. I, however, had very little idea as to what they actually meant.

You win a DOUBLE gold star!

[kieferskunk]

Hehe, cool! Glad to help

[ssha]

Very elucidating, thank you!

I have previously had some basic instruction in how binary works, but have since forgotten almost everything about it.

My brain groks most math & science related things quite well, even post-brain surgeries. The difficulty comes in when I try to do things without paper. I used to be able to do long-division and multi-digit multiplication in my head without a problem. If I try now, I forget too quickly to make any sense of it. Though, I did devise a non-traditional system for doing math in my head that makes things a lot easier, so long as I don't have to remember anything too complex, or too many values at a time.