2.1 KiB
A byte is a unit of measurement of the size of information on a computer or other electronic device. A single byte is usually eight bits. Some early computers used six bits for each byte. Bits are the smallest unit of storage on a computer, a single on/off value. Bytes are often represented by the capital letter B, bits by a lower case b.
A single typed character (for example, 'x' or '8') is stored in one byte. The character is held as a binary number which encodes a text character. To map each number to a character an agreed code such as EBCDIC or ASCII is needed. EBCDIC is a character encoding used mainly on mainframe computers. It uses 8 bits per byte. ASCII is another encoding that only uses seven bits. Extended ASCII uses 8 bits to give more types of characters, mostly used on personal computers.
Introducing a qyte
In the field of quantum information science we want to draw similar enough connections. A qyte is a unit of measurement of the size of quantum information on quantum devices. A single qyte is usually 8 qubits. Some earlier computers used binary qubits for each byte. This is not the case for the kyte.
[!note] This principle goes back at least as far as Aristotle, who wrote "Nature operates in the shortest way possible."