What makes computer code ‘work’

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By this I mean, when you write code, what exactly gives that the power to do anything is it more code? 0’s and 1’s? more so, what gives that thing the power to do anything? At some stage I can only deduce what must just be magic making it work because it’ll boil down to something metal and plastic ‘talking to’ an electric current, which doesn’t make sense at all

In: Engineering

17 Answers

Anonymous 0 Comments

Computer code that a human writes gets translated into “machine code.” Machine code is basically, as you say, ones and zeros. Those ones and zeros are stored in physical memory as on/off states- in other words, one of two electrical voltage levels (typically zero volts and a specific non-zero voltage). Those on/off voltage states propagate as electric currents through wires in the processor, memory, etc, which in turn activate or deactivate transistors, when then in turn allow or stop voltages from flowing to other components. These 1/0 voltage states control a complex network of transistor “switches,” and hence ultimately control the paths between electrical inputs (keyboard, touch screen, etc) and outputs (display, speaker, etc). This is the fundamental machinery of a computer.

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