Cambridge (CIE) IGCSE Your notes

Computer Science
Text, Sound & Images
Contents
Character Sets
Representing Sound
Representing Images

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 Character Sets
Your notes
Character Sets
What is a character set?
A character set is all the characters and symbols that can be represented by a
computer system
Each character is given a unique binary code
Character sets are ordered logically, the code for ‘B’ is one more than the code for ‘A’
A character set provides a standard for computers to communicate and send/receive
information
Without a character set, one system might interpret 01000001 differently from another
The number of characters that can be represented is determined by the number of bits
used by the character set
Two common character sets are:
American Standard Code for Information Interchange (ASCII)
Universal Character Encoding (UNICODE)

ASCII
What is ASCII?
ASCII is a character set and was an accepted standard for information interchange
ASCII uses 7 bits, providing 27 unique codes (128) or a maximum of 128 characters it can
represent

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 Your notes

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 ASCII only represents basic characters needed for English, limiting its use for other
languages
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Extended ASCII
Extended ASCII uses 8 bits, providing 256 unique codes (28 = 256) or a maximum of 256
characters it can represent
Extended ASCII provides essential characters such as mathematical operators and more
recent symbols such as ©

Limitations of ASCII & extended ASCII

ASCII has a limited number of characters which means it can only represent the English
alphabet, numbers and some special characters
A, B, C, ………, Z
a, b, c ,.............,z
0, 1, 2,........, 9
!, @, #, …..
ASCII cannot represent characters from languages other than English
ASCII does not include modern symbols or emojis common in today's digital
communication

UNICODE
What is UNICODE?
UNICODE is a character set and was created as a solution to the limitations of ASCII
UNICODE uses a minimum of 16 bits, providing 216 unique codes (65,536) or a minimum
of 65,536 characters it can represent
UNICODE can represent characters from all the major languages around the world

Examiner Tips and Tricks

Exam questions often ask you to compare ASCII & UNICODE, for example the number
of bits, number of characters and what they store

ASCII vs UNICODE
ASCII UNICODE

Number of bits 7-bits 16-bits

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Number of 128 characters 65,536 characters
characters
Your notes
Uses Used to represent characters in Used to represent characters
the English language. across the world.

Benefits It uses a lot less storage space It can represent more characters
than UNICODE. than ASCII.
It can support all common
characters across the world.
It can represent special
characters such as emoji's.

Drawbacks It can only represent 128 It uses a lot more storage space
characters. than ASCII.
It cannot store special characters
such as emoji's.

Worked Example
The computer stores text using the ASCII character set.

Part of the ASCII character set is shown:

Character ASCII Denary Code

E 69

F 70

G 71

H 72

(a)
Identify the character that will be represented by the ASCII denary code 76 [1]
(b)
Identify a second character set [1]
Answers
(a) L (must be a capital)

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(b) UNICODE

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 Representing Sound
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How Sound is Sampled & Stored
How is sound sampled & stored?
Measurements of the original sound wave are captured and stored as binary on
secondary storage
Sound waves begin as analogue and for a computer system to understand them they
must be converted into a digital form
This process is called Analogue to Digital conversion (A2D)
The process begins by measuring the amplitude of the analogue sound wave at a point
in time, called samples
Each measurement (sample) generates a value which can be represented in binary and
stored
Using the samples, a computer is able to create a digital version of the original analogue
wave
The digital wave is stored on secondary storage and can be played back at any time by
reversing the process

In this example, the grey line represents the digital wave that has been created by taking
samples of the original analogue wave
In order for the digital wave to look more like the analogue wave the sample rate and bit
depth can be changed

Sample Rate & Sample Resolution

What is sample rate?
Sample rate is the amount of samples taken per second of the analogue wave
Samples are taken each second for the duration of the sound

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 The sample rate is measured in Hertz (Hz)
1 Hertz is equal to 1 sample of the sound wave Your notes

In this example you can see that the higher the sample rate, the closer to the original sound
wave the digital version looks

The sampling rate of a typical audio CD is 44.1kHz (44,100 Hertz or 44,100 samples per
second)
Using the graphic above helps to answer the question, “Why does telephone hold music
sound so bad?”

What is sample resolution?

Sample resolution is the number of bits stored per sample of sound
Sample resolution is closely related to the colour depth of a bitmap image, they
measure the same thing in different contexts

What effect do sample rate and sample resolution

have?

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 Sample rate Sample resolution
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High Low High Low

Playback quality ⇑ ⇓ ⇑ ⇓

File size ⇑ ⇓ ⇑ ⇓

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 Representing Images
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Bitmap Images
What is a bitmap?
A bitmap image is made up of squares called pixels
A pixel is the smallest element of a bitmap image
Each pixel is stored as a binary code
Binary codes are unique to the colour in each pixel
A typical example of a bitmap image is a photograph

The more colours and more detail in the image, the higher the quality of the image and
the more binary that needs to be stored

Resolution & Colour Depth

What is resolution?
Resolution is the total amount of pixels that make up a bitmap image
The resolution is calculated by multiplying the height and width of the image (in pixels)
In general, the higher the resolution the more detail in the image (higher quality)
Resolution can also refer to the total amount of pixels horizontally in a display, such as:
Computer monitors - 1440p means 1440 pixels horizontally compared to 4K which
is 3840 pixels (roughly 4 thousand)

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 TVs - HD (high definition) channels have a resolution of 1080p, 1080 pixels
horizontally compared to newer UHD (ultra high definition) channels with 3840 pixels
(4K) Your notes
YouTube - The quality button allows a user to change the video playback resolution
from 144p (144 pixels horizontally) up to 4K
What is colour depth?
Colour depth is the number of bits stored per pixel in a bitmap image
The colour depth is dependent on the number of colours needed in the image
In general, the higher the colour depth the more detail in the image (higher quality)
In a black & white image the colour depth would be 1, meaning 1 bit is enough to create a
unique binary code for each colour in the image (1=white, 0=black)

In an image with a colour depth of 2, you would have 00, 01, 10 & 11 available binary
codes, so 4 colours

As colour depth increases, so does the amount of colours available in an image

The amount of colours can be calculated as 2n (n = colour depth)

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 Colour Depth Amount of Colours
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1 bit 2 (B&W)

2 bit 4

4 bit 16

8 bit 256

24 bit 16,777,216 (True Colour)

What is the impact of resolution and colour depth?

As the resolution and/or colour depth increases, the bigger the size of the file
becomes on secondary storage
The higher the resolution, the more pixels are in the image, the more bits are stored
The higher the colour depth, the more bits per pixel are stored
Striking a balance between quality and file size is always a consideration

Worked Example
1. Define the term Pixel [1]
2. If an image has a colour depth of 2 bits, how many colours can the image represent?
[1]
3. Describe the impact of changing an images resolution from 500x500 to
1000x1000 [2]
Answers
1. The smallest element of a bitmap image (1 square)
2. 4

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3. The image quality would be higher [1] the file size would be larger [1]

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