Is there something special about the number 65535?
- by Nick Rosencrantz
2¹6-1 & 25 = 25 (or? obviously ?)
A developer asked me today what is bitwise 65535 & 32 i.e. 2¹6-1 & 25 = ?
I thought at first spontaneously 32 but it seemed to easy whereupon I thought for several minutes and then answered 32. 32 seems to have been the correct answer but how? 65535=2¹6-1=1111111111111111 (but it doesn't seem right since this binary number all ones should be -1(?)), 32 = 100000
but I could not convert that in my head whereupon I anyway answered 32 since I had to answer something. Is the answer 32 in fact trivial? Is in the same way 2¹6-1 &
25-1 =31? Why did the developer ask me about exactly 65535?
Binary what I was asked to evaluate was 1111111111111111 &
100000 but I don't understand why 1111111111111111 is not -1.
Shouldn't it be -1? Is 65535 a number that gives overflow and how do I know that?
