Reviewer

Jack Goldsmith

Software engineer and computer science instructor

LinkedIn

14tools reviewed
3guides

About Jack

Jack Goldsmith is a software engineer and data analyst in New York with a background in teaching. He taught computer science one-on-one at Arts and Athletics, where he worked through students' code with them, and taught Regents Algebra as a lead math teacher at Success Academy. He is an IT and data analysis fellow at the NYC Department of Health and Mental Hygiene and holds a BA in computer science from Queens College. On binarytranslator.ai he checks that worked examples and step-by-step explanations are correct and easy to follow.

In Jack's words

When a student gets binary wrong, it's almost never the math. It's a step the explanation skipped.

Tools Jack reviewed

Byte converterKB to MBMB to KBMB to GBKB to GBBytes to MBGB to TBGB to MBTB to GBBytes to KBBits to bytesGiB to GBMbps to GbpsDownload time

Guides

The xxd command turns hello.txt into the hex 4865 6c6c 6f2c.Programming

The xxd command: hex dumps on Linux and macOS

Use xxd to read the bytes in any file, get plain hex with -p, turn hex back into binary with -r, patch a byte, print bits, make C arrays and diff binary files.9 min readPython bin(200) returns 0b11001000.Programming

Convert int to binary and hex in Python, and back

Convert integers to binary, hex and octal strings in Python and back again. Padding, removing the 0b prefix, negative numbers in two's complement, text to binary and a cheat sheet.9 min readBoolean algebra: 1 OR 1 equals 1.Binary basics

Boolean algebra explained

Boolean algebra from the start: the three operations, every law in one table, three worked simplifications, truth tables, sum of products, and a calculator that builds the table for you.8 min read

Questions for Jack

How do you check a worked example?
I work it by hand first, without looking at the answer, the way a student would. If I have to guess at any step, the explanation is missing something, even when the final answer is right.
What helps students learn place value?
Connecting it to what they already know. 345 means 3 hundreds, 4 tens and 5 ones, and 101 in binary means 1 four, 0 twos and 1 one. Same idea, different base. From teaching algebra, I've found that link does more than any rule to memorize.
What is the most common mistake?
Reading the bits from the wrong end. The rightmost bit is worth 1, not the leftmost, and a lot of wrong answers start there.
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