We are independent & ad-supported. We may earn a commission for purchases made through our links.
Advertiser Disclosure
Our website is an independent, advertising-supported platform. We provide our content free of charge to our readers, and to keep it that way, we rely on revenue generated through advertisements and affiliate partnerships. This means that when you click on certain links on our site and make a purchase, we may earn a commission. Learn more.
How We Make Money
We sustain our operations through affiliate commissions and advertising. If you click on an affiliate link and make a purchase, we may receive a commission from the merchant at no additional cost to you. We also display advertisements on our website, which help generate revenue to support our work and keep our content free for readers. Our editorial team operates independently of our advertising and affiliate partnerships to ensure that our content remains unbiased and focused on providing you with the best information and recommendations based on thorough research and honest evaluations. To remain transparent, we’ve provided a list of our current affiliate partners here.
Hardware

Our Promise to you

Founded in 2002, our company has been a trusted resource for readers seeking informative and engaging content. Our dedication to quality remains unwavering—and will never change. We follow a strict editorial policy, ensuring that our content is authored by highly qualified professionals and edited by subject matter experts. This guarantees that everything we publish is objective, accurate, and trustworthy.

Over the years, we've refined our approach to cover a wide range of topics, providing readers with reliable and practical advice to enhance their knowledge and skills. That's why millions of readers turn to us each year. Join us in celebrating the joy of learning, guided by standards you can trust.

What is EBCDIC?

By Damir Wallener
Updated: May 16, 2024
Views: 26,570
Share

EBCDIC, Extended Binary Coded Decimal Interchange Code, was developed in 1963 by IBM as an extension to the older Binary Coded Decimal (BCD) standard. BCD encodes the 10 digits of the standard counting system using 4 binary counters, or bits, where an individual bit can be either a 1 or a 0.

BCD for Numeric Characters

DigitEBCDIC
0 0000
1 0001
2 0010
3 0011
4 0100
5 0101
6 0110
7 0111
8 1000
9 1001

By establishing BCD as a standard, IBM allowed users to move shared data between computers with the use of punch cards. The roots of BCD lay, in fact, in the row and column layout of IBM's original computer punch cards. With EBCDIC, IBM extended the approach to 8 bits, allowing encoding not only of digits, but also of upper and lower case letters, formatting codes such as headers and carriage returns, and basic communication controls such as Request, Acknowledge, and Bell. This allowed users of IBM's mainframe computers to share not only data, but actual programming code as well.

EBCDIC is eight bits, or one byte, wide. Each byte consists of two nibbles, each four bits wide. The first four bits define the class of character, while the second nibble defines the specific character inside that class. For example, setting the first nibble to all-ones, 1111, defines the character as a number, and the second nibble defines which number is encoded.

In recent years, EBCDIC has been expanded to 16- and 32-bit variants to allow for representation of large, non-latin character sets. Each EBCDIC variant is known as a codepage, identified by its Coded Character Set Identifier, or CCSID. EBCDIC codepages have been created for a number of major writing scripts, including such complex ones as Chinese, Korean and Japanese.

All IBM mainframe computers, even the most recent models, continue to support EBCDIC so that legacy applications can be run without modification.

Share
EasyTechJunkie is dedicated to providing accurate and trustworthy information. We carefully select reputable sources and employ a rigorous fact-checking process to maintain the highest standards. To learn more about our commitment to accuracy, read our editorial process.
Discussion Comments
Share
https://www.easytechjunkie.com/what-is-ebcdic.htm
Copy this link
EasyTechJunkie, in your inbox

Our latest articles, guides, and more, delivered daily.

EasyTechJunkie, in your inbox

Our latest articles, guides, and more, delivered daily.