Introduction
Knowledge of binary number system and bit manipulation is less important in coding interviews as most Software Engineers do not have to deal with bits, which is more commonly used when dealing with lower level systems and programming languages. They are still asked sometimes, so you should at least still know how to convert a number from decimal form into binary form (and vice versa) in your chosen programming language.
Learning resources
- Readings
- Bits, Bytes, Building With Binary, basecs
- Bitwise operation, Wikipedia
- Videos
- Algorithms: Bit Manipulation, HackerRank
- Practice
Corner cases
- Be aware and check for overflow/underflow
- Negative numbers
Techniques
Questions involving binary representations and bitwise operations are asked sometimes and you must be absolutely familiar with how to convert a number from decimal form into binary form (and vice versa) in your chosen programming language.
Some helpful utility snippets:
Technique | Code |
Test k⌃th bit is set | num & (1 << k) != 0 |
Set k⌃th bit | num |= (1 << k) |
Turn off k⌃th bit | num &= ~(1 << k) |
Toggle the k⌃th bit | num ^= (1 << k) |
Multiply by 2⌃k | num << k |
Divide by 2⌃k | num >> k |
Check if a number is a power of 2 | (num & num - 1) == 0 or (num & (-num)) == num |
Swapping two variables | num1 ^= num2; num2 ^= num1; num1 ^= num2 |
Essential questions
These are essential questions to practice if you're studying for this topic.
Recommended practice questions
These are recommended questions to practice after you have studied for the topic and have practiced the essential questions.
