Aspects of Data Representation in Programming
Data representation covers multiple aspects, including how data is stored, manipulated, and transmitted. Below is a structured breakdown of key aspects:
1. Numeric Data Representation A. Integer Representation
Unsigned integers (only positive values)Signed integers (Two’s complement, Sign-Magnitude, One’s complement)BCD (Binary-Coded Decimal) Representation
B. Floating-Point Representation
IEEE 754 Standard (Single & Double Precision) Fixed-Point Representation (for embedded systems)Denormalized and Normalized numbers Precision errors in floating-point arithmetic
2. Character and Text Representation
ASCII (American Standard Code for Information Interchange) Extended ASCII (8-bit encoding) Unicode (UTF-8, UTF-16, UTF-32) EBCDIC (Extended Binary Coded Decimal Interchange Code) Character encoding and its impact on text processing
3. Boolean Data Representation
Boolean values (0 and 1) Boolean logic operations (AND, OR, NOT, XOR) Boolean representation in memory (1-bit vs. byte alignment)
4. Complex Data Structure Representation A. Arrays
One-dimensional and Multi-dimensional arrays Row-major vs. Column-major ordering Memory alignment of array elements
B. Linked Lists
Singly Linked Lists (Node-based representation) Doubly Linked Lists Circular Linked Lists Memory representation of linked structures
C. Stacks and Queues
Array-based vs. Linked List-based implementation LIFO (Last-In-First-Out) and FIFO (First-In-First-Out) storage
D. Hash Tables and Hashing Techniques
Direct Addressing vs. Hashing Collision Handling (Chaining, Open Addressing) Hash Functions and their role in data retrieval efficiency
5. Data Storage and File Representation A. Data Storage Units
Bits, Bytes, Kilobytes, Megabytes, Gigabytes, etc. Memory addressing and endianness (Big-endian vs. Little-endian)
B. File Formats and Data Exchange
Text-Based Formats: JSON, XML, CSV, YAML Binary Formats: Images (JPEG, PNG), Audio (MP3, WAV), Video (MP4, AVI) Compression (Lossless vs. Lossy formats) Serialization (Object-to-binary conversion in Java/Python/other languages)
6. Data Compression Techniques A. Lossless Compression (No data loss)
Huffman Coding Lempel-Ziv-Welch (LZW) Run-Length Encoding (RLE)
B. Lossy Compression (Data loss occurs for efficiency)
JPEG (Image compression) MP3 (Audio compression) MPEG (Video compression)
7. Bitwise Operations and Optimization
Bitwise AND, OR, XOR, NOT, Shift operations Masking and Flag Operations Using bitwise operations for performance optimization Memory-efficient data storage using bit fields
8. Memory Representation and Management
Stack vs. Heap memory allocation Garbage Collection in High-Level Languages Virtual Memory and Paging Data Alignment and Padding in Structs and Classes
By
MOUSTAFA ALSAYEH
