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Bitwise NOT

The NOT bitwise operation takes one set of bits, and for each bit returns 0 if the bit is 1, and 1 if the bit is 0.

~ 0 → -1 ~ 1 → -2

When performing NOT on an integer, each bit of the integer is inverted.

~ 5 # gives -6 # At the bit level: # ~ 0000 0101 (5) # = 1111 1010 (-6)

If you're unsure why the resulting number is negative in this example, it's because numbers are represented using two's complement. Read up on binary numbers here.

See also:

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