The term "binary" simply refers to anything that has only two parts or pieces. For example, a "binary choice" is a choice between two things. In the context of computing, binary codes are used to store information. Computer scientists often refer to the two binary symbols as on/off or true/false or 0/1. There are lots of different ways to store information, so why use binary? The answer is simply because transistors are the foundation of computation in all modern computers, and transistors have two "states".