This list provides an inventory of character coding standards mainly before modern standards like ISO/IEC 646 etc. Some of these standards have been deeply involved in historic events that still have consequences. One notable example of this is the ITA2 coding used during World War II (1939–1945). The nature of these standards is not as common knowledge like it is for ASCII or EBCDIC or their slang names. While 8-bit is the de facto standard as of 2016, in the past 5-bit and 6-bit were more prevalent or their multiple.
Code Introduction Width Usage Morse code c. 1837–1840 varies Electrical telegraphs Baudot code / ITA1 1870 5 bits Piano-like telegraph operation, SIGCUM cipher operation Chinese telegraph code 1881 4 digits Chinese telegraph communications Murray code 1901 5 bits Machine run telegraph operation using punched paper, moved optimization from minimal operator fatigue to minimal machinery wear ITA2 1924 5 bits Teletypewrite, Telecommunications devices for the deaf (TDD), Telex, Amateur radio, Radioteletype (RTTY), Financial info by Deutsche Börse, Enigma machine and T52 during WWII BCDIC 1928 6 bits Introduced with the IBM card FIELDATA 1956 6/7 bits Battlefield information (USA) CDC display code 1963 6 bits Control Data Corporation computers DEC SIXBIT/ECMA-1 1963 6 bits Digital Equipment EBCDIC 1963 8 bits IBM computers ASCII1963-06-17 (ASA X3.4-1963) 7 bits Teleprinters and computers; original definition of ASCII GOST 10859 1964 4/5/6/7 bits Soviet Union ECMA-61965-04-30 7 bits ASCII localization ISO 6461967 (ISO/R646-1967) 7 bits ASCII localization ASCII1967 (USAS X3.4-1967) 7 bits Close to "modern" definition of ASCII Transcode 1967 7 bits IBM data transmission terminal 2780, 3780 Recommendation V.3 IA5 1968 7 bits MARC-8 1968 7 bits Library computer systems Braille ASCII 1969 6/7 bits Tactile print for blind persons JIS X 0201 1969 6/7 bits First Japanese electronic character set ECMA-48 1972 7 bits Terminal text manipulation and colors ISO/IEC 8859 1987 8 bits International codes ISO/IEC 10646 (Unicode) 199121 bits usable, packed into 8/16/32-bit code units Unified encoding for most of the world's writing systems. As first introduced in 1991 had 16 bits; extension to 21 bits came later. KPS 9566 1993 North Korean 2-byte character code set
See also ANSEL SBCS (single-byte character set) DBCS (double-byte character set) TBCS (triple-byte character set) ITU T.61 DEC Radix-50 Cork encoding Prosigns for Morse code Telegraph code TV Typewriter SI 960 (7-bit Hebrew ISO/IEC 646) Figure space (typographic unit equal to the size of a single typographic figure) Six-bit character code List of binary codes
References
External links circuitousroot.com: Codes that Don't Count