A computer word is a measurement of the size of the "natural" amount of computer memory a particular computer uses. For instance, many early computers used 36 bits in a word, that is, the computer would read and write 36 bits at a time. This number was based on the common need to store floating-point numbers of 7-digit precision, while, at the same time, it was common to use 6-bit characters. The terms storage (U.K.) or memory (U.S.) refer to the parts of a digital computer that retain physical state (data) for some interval of time, possibly even after electrical power to the computer is turned off. ... A bit (abbreviated b) is the most basic information unit used in computing and information theory. ... A floating-point number is a digital representation for a number in a certain subset of the rational numbers, and is often used to approximate an arbitrary real number on a computer. ... For alternate meanings, see character. ...

A 36-bit machine would handle 6 characters at a time, that caused the early versions of Fortran to use 6-character identifiers (6×6=36). Lower cost minicomputers would use 12 bit words. The CDC 6600 supercomputers used 60 bit words. The Soviet BESM-6 mainframes used 48 bit words. Fortran (also FORTRAN) is a statically typed, compiled, programming language originally developed in the 1950s and still heavily used for scientific computing and numerical computation half a century later. ... HP2114 minicomputer Minicomputer is a largely obsolete term for a class of multi-user computers which make up the middle range of the computing spectrum, in between the largest multi-user systems (mainframe computers) and the smallest single-user systems (microcomputers or personal computers). ... The CDC 6600 was a mainframe computer from Control Data Corporation, first manufactured in 1965. ... A supercomputer is a device for turning compute-bound problems into I/O-bound problems. ... BESM BESM (БЭСМ) stands for Большая Электронно-Счётная Машина (Bolshaja Elektronno-Schetnaja Mashina) in Russian, which can be translated as Large Electronic-Computing Machine or simply Large Computer. Several types of BESM have been built. ... Mainframes (often colloquially referred to as big iron) are large and expensive computers used mainly by government institutions and large companies for legacy applications, typically bulk data processing (such as censuses, industry/consumer statistics, ERP, and bank transaction processing). ...

Today the 6-bit character has largely disappeared, and the basic unit for computer words is 8-bits, or a byte. This change occurred when computers became more commonly used for text processing, which required 7 or 8 bits to store an ASCII character. The first machine to widely introduce the 8-bit multiple for words was the IBM System/360 in 1964, and it quickly took over the entire market. This article refers to the unit of binary information. ... There are 95 printable ASCII characters, numbered 32 to 126. ... International Business Machines Corporation (IBM, or colloquially, Big Blue) (NYSE: IBM) (incorporated June 15, 1911, in operation since 1888) is headquartered in Armonk, New York, USA. The company manufactures and sells computer hardware, software, and services. ... The IBM System/360 (S/360) is a computer system family announced by International Business Machines on April 7, 1964. ... 1964 was a leap year starting on Wednesday (link will take you to calendar). ...

Today the term "word" is rarely used, and instead we simply refer to the number of bits. For instance most common CPUs today use a 32-bit word, but we refer to them as "32-bit processors". The central processing unit (CPU) is the part of a computer that interprets and carries out the instructions contained in the software. ... 32-bit is a term applied to processors, and computer architectures which manipulate the address and data in 32-bit chunks. ...