What is the "HOST BITS" setting on a Hand Reader with an Ethernet Module?

Handreaders require a static (fixed) IP address; this means you have to set its IP address, subnet mask and default gateway.
These are usually assigned or issued by your local network administrator.

At the handreader setup menu, it doesn’t ask you for the subnet mask; instead, it asks for the “host bits”.
The “host bits” are the number of ‘zero’ bits, when you write out the subnet mask in binary form (make sure to fill out the full octets).
For example, the subnet mask 255.255.255.0 (decimal format) would translate to
11111111 .11111111 .11111111 .00000000 (binary format); each decimal number takes up 8 bits;
 so the number of ‘zero’ bits in this example is 8.

A full table of subnet mask to host bit conversion is attached below, on the second page:

Ethernet Setup and Host Bits Table

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