fixed-width encoding

noun

UK /fɪkst wɪdθ ɪnˈkəʊdɪŋ/

US /fɪkst wɪdθ ɪnˈkoʊdɪŋ/

A way to store letters where every letter takes up the same amount of space.

The old system used fixed-width encoding, so every character took exactly two bytes.

SYNONYMS

constant-width encoding fixed-length encoding uniform-width encoding fixed-size character encoding

RELATED WORDS

character set code point byte Unicode ASCII

OTHER MEANINGS

2. A character encoding in which each code point is represented by the same number of bytes.

ASCII is a fixed-width encoding that uses one byte per character.

3. A data format where every record or field occupies the same number of bytes.

The log file used fixed-width encoding so each line was exactly 80 characters long.

4. A font or display scheme in which every glyph occupies the same horizontal space.

The terminal used a fixed-width encoding, making columns line up neatly.