Machine Code

Machine code is a set of binary instructions (composed of 0s and 1s) that a computer’s central processing unit (CPU) can directly execute. It represents the fundamental operations of a computer, such as arithmetic, data movement, and logic processing, at the hardware level. Unlike high-level programming languages, machine code is hardware-specific and extremely difficult for humans to read or write. Programs written in high-level or assembly languages are typically translated into machine code by compilers or assemblers during the software development process. Each instruction in machine code corresponds to a specific operation performed by the CPU, such as loading data into a register or performing an addition. For example, an operation like 10110000 might instruct the processor to move a value into a register. Machine code execution is fast and efficient, making it suitable for performance-critical applications. However, its complexity and lack of portability make it impractical for direct programming. Instead, developers rely on higher-level languages to write software and use tools to translate it into machine code for execution.