How do parity generators and checkers work for error detection?

Parity is a simple error detection scheme. A parity generator computes parity bit by XORing all data bits; even parity makes total 1s even, odd parity makes it odd. Parity checker XORs received data plus parity bit; output should be 0 for even parity or 1 for odd parity if no errors. Parity detects single-bit errors but cannot detect even numbers of errors or identify error location. For better protection, codes like Hamming (single-error correction) or CRC (burst error detection) are used.