how do you actually store data into light so it transmits it?
In: Physics
Binary is a series of ones and zeros. Light on = 1. Light off = 0. Now you can alternate. Give it a clock cycle so you can tell when one bit ends and another begins, and vwallah. Data transmission.
You know Morse code?
Like that, but really fast (billions of times faster), because computers are really fast.
Also it’s based on bits instead of letters.
If you’re talking about something like fiber optics, it’s the intensity, frequency, phase(imaginary numbers portion) and polarization of light that gets changed to represent data.
Sensors can detect minute changes in the light patterns and there’s nearly an infinite number of ways to change those 4 characteristics.
It’s not just binary on or off
If you understand binary it will make things a lot easier. Basically, the way computers count is using binary. They can’t count to 10 like us humans but they can count in base 2 or binary. If an electrical signal or light is on then that represents a 1 and if it is off it represents a 0. the number 2 in binary will be 10 because I can only have a 1 or a 0 and so we have to carry a 1 into the other column. example. 3 would be 11 as we can have the first 1 represent 2 and the second one represents 1 (2+1=3). 4 would be 100 in binary. If I want to send you information it will first be turned into binary so a string of 1s and 0s or light on and off signals and they can be decoded on the other side bu whoever is listening
The light IS the data. When it’s on, the receiver end treats that as 1 and when it’s off, it’s treated as 0. And computers only know 1s and 0s.
You don’t “store” data into light. The light is the medium which is used to represent the data being transmitted.
You can use light to represent data the same way you use any other material, particle or phenomena – by manipulating its physical properties by whatever means we know how and can measure. With light specifically, we can easily change its direction (what is it pointed at), intensity (how bright is it), frequency (what colour is it), polarisation (what direction is it vibrating), phase (relationship between different parts of the wave frequency) or more.
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