ASCII Code System
(American Standard Code for Information Interchange)
Introduction
The ASCII code system is a widely used character encoding standard that allows computers
and electronic devices to represent and communicate text using numbers. It stands for
American Standard Code for Information Interchange and was developed in the early
1960s by the American National Standards Institute (ANSI).
ASCII translates characters like letters, numbers, punctuation marks, and control signals into
binary codes, which can be processed and stored by digital systems.
Structure of ASCII
7-bit Encoding:
The original ASCII system uses 7 bits to represent each character. This means it can
represent a total of 2⁷ = 128 unique characters, with decimal values ranging from 0 to
127.
Categories of ASCII Characters:
1. Control Characters (0–31):
These characters are non-printable and are used to control devices (like
printers) or to manage text (like newline, tab, etc.).
Examples:
0: Null (NUL)
9: Horizontal Tab (TAB)
10: Line Feed (LF or New Line)
13: Carriage Return (CR)
2. Printable Characters (32–126):
These include letters, digits, punctuation marks, and symbols.
Examples:
32: Space
48–57: Digits '0' to '9'
65–90: Uppercase letters 'A' to 'Z'
97–122: Lowercase letters 'a' to 'z'
33–47, 58–64, 91–96, 123–126: Various punctuation and symbols
3. Delete Character (127):
This is also a non-printable control character, originally used to delete
characters on paper tape.
Examples of ASCII Codes
Character Binary Decimal
A 1000001 65
a 1100001 97
0 0110000 48
Space 0100000 32
! 0010001 33
Extended ASCII
The original 128-character ASCII set was later expanded to use 8 bits (1 byte),
allowing 256 characters.
The additional 128 characters (128–255) are used for:
o Graphic symbols
o Foreign language letters (e.g., é, ñ, ü)
o Line drawing characters and more
This extended version varies depending on the system (e.g., ISO 8859-1, Windows-
1252).
Applications of ASCII
Text Files: Simple text files (.txt) use ASCII encoding.
Programming: Many programming languages use ASCII values for string
manipulation and I/O operations.
Data Transmission: ASCII is used in protocols like HTTP, SMTP, and FTP for data
communication.
Keyboards: Every key corresponds to an ASCII code.
Embedded Systems: Often use ASCII for communication and data logging.
Advantages
Simple and efficient for basic English text.
Universally supported across platforms and devices.
Lightweight in terms of storage and processing.
Limitations
Limited to English and basic symbols.
Not suitable for representing characters in other languages (e.g., Chinese, Arabic,
etc.).
Lacks support for emoji’s and complex symbols.
Conclusion
The ASCII code system laid the foundation for modern character encoding methods. Though
more advanced encodings like UTF-8 and Unicode are now widely used to support global
languages and symbols, ASCII remains a fundamental and reliable standard, especially in
systems where simplicity and compatibility are important.
