Combinations or Permutations of bits I am a computer science major and was explaining to someone how a computer uses bits to represent numbers.  If you have $1$ bit, you can have $0$ or $1$.  With $2$ bits, you can have $00, 01, 10, 11$ or $0, 1, 2, 3$ in decimal.  And so on, up to $32$ bits, where you can have about $4.2$ billion.... what?  Combinations or Permutations?
 A: For each bit, there are two options. 
As you see, with two bits, there $2\cdot 2 = 2^2$ possible distinct strings.
With three bits, there are $2\cdot 2\cdot 2 = 2^3 = 8$ possible distinct strings.
$\quad \vdots$
Wit $32$ bits at our disposal, there are $2^{32}$ distinct strings that can be formed.
A: neither of the two, but states
Here's why? say we have 4 bits then the sum of configurations (states) from possible combinations for it would be $$\sum_{n=0}^4 4C_n $$ from $$ \sum_{n=0}^N NC_n  = 2^N $$$$ where\,N = no.\,of\,bits  \\where\,n = no.\,of\,set\,bits\\and\,C = combination\,operator $$$$i.e. 4C_0 + 4C_1 + 4C_2 + 4C_3 + 4C_4 = sum\,of\, the\,5\,possible\,combinations =  2^4  states $$ as per the addition of $$4C_0[1]  = \begin{cases}
0000 
\end{cases} \\ \\ 4C_1[4]  = \begin{cases}
0001 \\
0010 \\
0100 \\
1000 \\
\end{cases} \\ 4C_2 [6] = \begin{cases}
0011 \\
0101 \\
0110 \\
1001 \\
1010 \\
1100 \\
\end{cases} \\ 4C_3 [4] = \begin{cases}
0111 \\
1011 \\
1101 \\
1110 \\
\end{cases}\\ 4C_4 [1] = \begin{cases}
1111
\end{cases} $$
to give 16 states in total
A: Bit significance is based on permutations. If I had 001 & 100 and bit significance was based on combination, the previous two would be equal. However, since the order of the bits matter, the bits' significance is based on permutations.
