ASCII

[ as-kee ]

noun

, Computers.

1. American Standard Code for Information Interchange: a standard code, consisting of 128 7-bit combinations, for characters stored in a computer or to be transmitted between computers.

ASCII

/ ˈæskiː /

acronym for

1. American standard code for information interchange: a computer code for representing alphanumeric characters

ASCII

/ ăs′kē /

1. A code that assigns the numbers 0 through 127 to the letters of the alphabet, the digits 0 through 9, punctuation marks, and certain other characters. For example, the capital letter A is coded as 65 (binary 1000001). By standardizing the values used to represent written text, ASCII enables computers to exchange information. Basic, or standard, ASCII uses seven bits for each character code, giving it 2 ⁷, or 128, unique symbols. Various larger character sets, called extended ASCII, use eight bits for each character, yielding 128 additional codes numbered 128 to 255.
2. Compare Unicode

ASCII

1. An acronym for A merican S tandard C ode for I nformation I nterchange. Computers use this code to standardize communication between different machines.

Word History and Origins

Origin of ASCII¹

First recorded in 1960–65

Example Sentences

The terminal has what we crave: ASCII, unadorned URLs, and the complexities of managing a Python environment.

From The Verge

This useless Hori effort made me think of ASCII’s awesome Gamecube controller keyboard, designed for Phantasy Star Online: Just look at it!

From The Verge

The accented characters of several European languages and characters of some other languages were taken into account from 1986 onwards with 8-bit variants of ASCII, also called extended ASCII, that provided sets of 256 characters.

From Project Gutenberg

The etexts, later called ebooks, were stored in the simplest way, using the low set of ASCII, called Plain Vanilla ASCII, for them to be read on any hardware and software.

From Project Gutenberg

Whether digitized years ago or now, all Project Gutenberg books are created in 7-bit plain ASCII, called Plain Vanilla ASCII.

From Project Gutenberg