Binary

Binary Bi"na*ry, a. [L. binarius, fr. bini two by two, two at  a time, fr. root of bis twice; akin to E. two: cf. F.   binaire.]   Compounded or consisting of two things or parts;   characterized by two (things).

{Binary arithmetic}, that in which numbers are expressed according to the binary scale, or in which two figures only, 0 and 1, are used, in lieu of ten; the cipher multiplying everything by two, as in common arithmetic by     ten. Thus, 1 is one; 10 is two; 11 is three; 100 is four,

{Binary star} (Astron.), a double star whose members have a     revolution round their common center of gravity.

Binary Bi"na*ry, n.  That which is constituted of two figures, things, or parts;   two; duality.

binary

1. {Base} two. A number representation consisting of zeros and ones used by practically all computers because of its ease of implementation using digital electronics and {Boolean algebra}.

2. Any file format for {digital} {data} encoded as a sequence of {bit}s but not consisting of a sequence of  printable {characters} ({text}). The term is often used for executable {machine code}.

Of course all digital data, including characters, is actually binary data (unless it uses some (rare) system with more than  two discrete levels) but the distinction between binary and text is well established.

3. A description of an {operator} which takes two {arguments}.

This also refers to executable files in Unix-based systems.

There are only 10 types of people in the world, those who understand binary and those who don`t.