Information = Data + Meaning.

Information is data that has no meaning.

Suppose someone comes up to you and gives you a piece of paper with 18593739 written on it. The number could mean absolutely anything. They might be telling you their birthday, or how much money you owe them, or they might be giving you their phone number.

Data only becomes information when you know the context of the data.

Information = Data + Meaning.

1) Computers are machines that process data. They do not understand the data they process.

2) If you get a computer to process data that's incorrect, the results will be meaningless. This is called Garbage In, Garbage Out (GIGO).

3) Some people call this 'computer error'. They're wrong - it's human error. Computers hardly ever make mistakes. They just do what they're programmed to do.

Data is stored in Bytes

Computers run on electricity and consist of a number od electric circuits, and each circuit can be in one of only two states - on or off. Computers use a binary code (i.e. they only use 2 digits) to represent data. Usually, a circuit that's switched on represents the digit 1, and a circuit that's switched off represents the digit 0 - similar to morse code which is either a dot or a dash.

Bit - Each individual 1 or 0 is called a bit - short of binary digit.

Byte - 8 bits is called a byte.

Kilobyte - 1 kilobyte (1KB) is about a thousand bytes. To be exact, 1KB = 2¹º = 1024 bytes.

Megabyte - 1 megabyte (1MB) is about a million bytes. To be exact, 1MB = 2²º = 1 048 576 bytes

Gigabyte - 1 gigabyte (1GB) is about a thousand million bytes. To be exact, 1GB = 2³º = 1 073 741 824 bytes.