Endianness
Endianness is a fundamental concept in computer science that describes the byte order in which multibyte data types (like integers or floating-point numbers) are stored in memory. It determines whether the most significant byte (big-endian) or least significant byte (little-endian) is stored at the lowest memory address. This concept is crucial for data serialization, network communication, and interoperability between systems with different architectures.
Developers should learn endianness when working with low-level programming, embedded systems, network protocols, or file formats that involve binary data exchange between different hardware architectures. It is essential for ensuring correct data interpretation in cross-platform applications, such as when reading binary files, implementing network protocols like TCP/IP, or handling data from sensors in IoT devices. Understanding endianness helps prevent bugs related to data corruption during transmission or storage.