A photo of a cake with 8 candles in a row. The first and fifth candle from the right are lit. The caption reads "Happy 17th Birthday"
this post was submitted on 25 Feb 2026
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Who counts from right to left?
Is this image mirrored?
You will be surprised to hear that this is how we read decimal numbers too
Even in decimal, the most-significant digit is to the left. Binary in text form is no exception to this.
Unless we are talking little-endian, which would start with the least-significant bit.
Anyone who opens their egg on the small end deserves to be removed from our society.
Now that you mention it it is pretty fucky, but in every textbook thats tried to teach me counting in binary its gone from right to left.
It's not. Numbers are arranged (both binary and base 10) with the most significant digit on the left.
Whether you read the number from left to right or right to left is irrelevant and you can choose whichever one you want.
But it is completely consistent with base 10 (normal numbers).
Same here. University told me the lowest bit is on the right, the highest on the left. Never questioned it.
In kindergarten I was taught when reading the number 123, the lowest digit is on the right, and the highest on the left. Never questioned it either.
But that's a string.
Binary exists in both ~~big-endian~~LSb or ~~little-endian~~MSb. In other words, both directions can be valid.
As explained below: Endianness is specifically the order of bytes. I was under the impression that it also implied a specific order of bits but anyways, the correct terms for this discussion is Least/Most Significant bit order.
This is a single byte, so it's represented the same in big-endian vs little-endian. Endianness defines the order of bytes, not individual bits
Indeed, endianness is the order of bytes, my bad. I guess I meant LSb vs MSb
Ya, but we pretty much always write it with most significant on the left. The endianness is more to do with the order transmitted when serialized. Or are there cases where people actually write it backwards?
The way I see it, if you want to be pedantic about it (it being a joke photo, so potentially unintentionally reversed by the camera, of a cake which is in 3d space and can be seen in both directions) you might as well do it properly and acknowledge that different orders exist for bits.
Indeed writing conventions are also a good point, however this is not writing. People actually working at bit level are probably more likely to see bits on a scope (so in both LSb or MSb order) than as 1 and 0s written on a piece of paper or a screen.
Binary is always right to left? I've never seen it written left to right at least.
Cakes have multiple sides, you can have your bits in your chosen order if you turn up to the party in person
The people saying right to left is normal are either Australian or mirror universe folks.
At least I thought that until I looked up ascii conversations and then just random converters .... How have I forgotten this? The pic is right...
There are 3 leading "zeros"
Which would be ommited if they were on the end, so this reads 136