What fundamental role does ASCII play in computing?

ASCII, which stands for American Standard Code for Information Interchange, plays a fundamental role in computing by providing a standardized way to represent character data for text encoding. Each character, such as letters, numbers, and symbols, is assigned a specific numeric code in ASCII, allowing computers to understand and manipulate text as a series of numbers.

This encoding system is vital for communication between different devices and software, as it ensures that text can be accurately represented and understood across various platforms and programming languages. Because of this standardization, ASCII enables the seamless exchange of text-based information, making it essential for programming, data processing, and many applications that handle textual content.

The other options do not accurately describe the primary function of ASCII. For instance, while managing network traffic concerns data transmission, ASCII specifically deals with character representation rather than the flow or organization of data across networks. Similarly, storage of large data files and system performance optimization pertain to broader aspects of computing that are unrelated to the specific role of ASCII in encoding text.