What is Boolean algebra?
Boolean algebra sounds like a scary form of mathematics, but it’s actually quite simple by nature. As stated in the introduction, Boolean algebra has little to do with the algebra that is normally taught in high school or college. The goal behind Boolean algebra is to perform a series of operations on a 0
or 1
to determine whether the output of an equation is going to be either 0
or 1
.
If one really wanted to split hairs, there is a difference between Boolean algebra and Boolean logic. If one were to Google the difference, one would find that a lot of the definitions overlap. Even though there’s a slight difference between Boolean algebra and Boolean logic, in everyday speech, the terms are used interchangeably. In this book, we’re going to follow the conversational norm and use the terms interchangeably.
Boolean algebra is often used to model the behavior of electrical and software systems. This is because most sophisticated hardware...