Bitwise operation
computer operation that operates on values at the level of their individual bits
In computer programming, a bitwise operation operates on a bit string, a bit array or a binary numeral (considered as a bit string) at the level of its individual bits. It is a fast and simple action, basic to the higher-level arithmetic operations and directly supported by the processor. Most architectures provide only a few high value bitwise operations, presented as two-operand instructions where the result replaces one of the input operands.
On simple low-cost processors, typically, bitwise operations are substantially faster than division, several times faster than multiplication, and sometimes significantly faster than addition. While modern processors usually perform addition and multiplication just as fast as bitwise operations due to their longer instruction pipelines and other architectural design choices, bitwise operations do commonly use less power because of the reduced use of resources.
Bitwise operators
In the explanations below, any indication of a bit's position is counted from the right (least significant) side, advancing left. For example, the binary value 0001 (decimal 1) has zeroes at every position but the first (i.e., the rightmost) one.
NOT
The bitwise NOT, or bitwise complement, is a unary operation that performs logical negation on each bit, forming the ones' complement of the given binary value. Bits that are 0 become 1, and those that are 1 become 0. For example:
NOT 0111 (decimal 7)
= 1000 (decimal 8)
NOT 10101011 (decimal 171)
= 01010100 (decimal 84)
The result is equal to the two's complement of the value minus one.
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This entry incorporates text from “Bitwise operation” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.