Root Directory Definition The root directory, or root folder, is the top-level directory of a file system. The directory structure can be visually represented as an upside-down tree, so the term "root" represents the top level. All other directories within a volume are "branches" or subdirectories of the root directory. While all file systems have a root directory, it may labeled differently depending on the operating system. For example, in Windows, the default root directory is C:\. On Uni...

Bitrate Definition Bitrate, as the name implies, describes the rate at which bits are transferred from one location to another. In other words, it measures how much data is transmitted in a given amount of time. Bitrate is commonly measured in bits per second (bps), kilobits per second (Kbps), or megabits per second (Mbps). For example, a DSL connection may be able to download data at 768 kbps, while a Firewire 800 connection can transfer data up to 800 Mbps. Bitrate can also describe the quali...

Megabyte Definition A megabyte is 106 or 1,000,000 bytes. One megabyte (abbreviated "MB") is equal to 1,000 kilobytes and precedes the gigabyte unit of measurement. While a megabyte is technically 1,000,000 bytes, megabytes are often used synonymously with mebibytes, which contain 1,048,576 bytes (220 or 1,024 x 1,024 bytes). Megabytes are often used to measure the size of large files. For example, a high resolution JPEG image file might range is size from one to five megabytes. Uncompressed R...

Terabyte Definition A terabyte is 1012 or 1,000,000,000,000 bytes. One terabyte (abbreviated "TB") is equal to 1,000 gigabytes and precedes the petabyte unit of measurement. While a terabyte is exactly 1 trillion bytes, in some cases terabytes and tebibytes are used synonymously, though a tebibyte actually contains 1,099,511,627,776 bytes (1,024 gibibytes). Terabytes are most often used to measure the storage capacity of large storage devices. While hard drives were measured in gigabytes for m...

Kilobit Definition A kilobit is 103 or 1,000 bits. One kilobit (abbreviated "Kb") contains one thousand bits and there are 1,000 kilobits in a megabit. Kilobits (Kb) are smaller than than kilobytes (KB), since there are 8 kilobits in a single kilobyte. Therefore, a kilobit is one-eighth the size of a kilobyte. Before broadband Internet was common, Internet connection speeds were often measured in kilobits. For example, a 28.8K modem was able to receive data up to 28.8 kilobits per second (Kbps...

String Definition A string is a data type used in programming, such as an integer and floating point unit, but is used to represent text rather than numbers. It is comprised of a set of characters that can also contain spaces and numbers. For example, the word "hamburger" and the phrase "I ate 3 hamburgers" are both strings. Even "12345" could be considered a string, if specified correctly. Typically, programmers must enclose strings in quotation marks for the data to recognized as a string and ...

Mbps Definition Stands for "Megabits Per Second." One megabit is equal to one million bits or 1,000 kilobits. While "megabit" sounds similar to "megabyte," a megabit is roughly one eighth the size of a megabyte (since there are eight bits in a byte). Mbps is used to measure data transfer speeds of high bandwidth connections, such as Ethernet and cable modems.

Kbps Definition Stands for "Kilobits Per Second." 1 Kbps is equal to 1,000 bits per second. That means a 300 Kbps connection can transfer 300,000 bits in one second. 1,000 Kbps is equal to 1 Mbps. Kbps is primarily used to measure data transfer rates. For example, dial-up modems were rated by their maximum download speeds, such as 14.4, 28.8, and 56 Kbps. Throughout the 1990s and early 2000s, Kbps remained the standard way to measure data transfer dates. However, broadband connections such as c...

Byte Definition A byte is a data measurement unit that contains eight bits, or a series of eight zeros and ones. A single byte can be used to represent 28 or 256 different values. The byte was originally created to store a single character, since 256 values is sufficient to represent all lowercase and uppercase letters, numbers, and symbols in western languages. However, since some languages have more than 256 characters, modern character encoding standards, such as UTF-16, use two bytes, or 16...