Language Fundamentals

Language Fundamentals

1. ASCII and Unicode

   • Both are character sets allowing for the expression of characters for different languages. The primary difference is that ASCII only supports latin characters and some European variants.

2. Data Types

   • Primitives: These consist of eight different data categories that represent pure data. variables made with these types simply hold the value given and includes the following: integer, byte, short, long, float, double, char, and boolean.
   • Reference: These data types store values slightly differently than primitives. Where primitives encode and store the actual value, reference data types encode and store data, but store the address of that data in the variable rather than the data itself which is stored elsewhere.

3. Variables

   • Variables are placeholders in code for specific data types. Essentially labels that allow for the organization of data in a meaningful manner. Variable names are case sensitive and discrepancies are translated to separate variables. Constant variables are variables with finalized values that cannot be changed
   • Literals: These are variables who are assigned a direct value according to the data type. For example int x = 5 . There are literals for both primitive and reference types