Meaning of <<= and |=

SK9 picture SK9 · May 26, 2011 · Viewed 34.4k times · Source

What is the meaning of <<= and |= in C?

I recognise << is bitshift etc. but I don't know what these are in combination.

Answer

Chris Cooper picture Chris Cooper · May 26, 2011

Just as x += 5 means x = x + 5, so does x <<= 5 mean x = x << 5.

Same goes for |. This is a bitwise or, so x |= 8 would mean x = x | 8.

Here is an example to clarify:

int x = 1;
x <<= 2;         // x = x << 2;
printf("%d", x); // prints 4 (0b001 becomes 0b100)

int y = 15;
y |= 8;          // y = y | 8;
printf("%d", y); // prints 15, since (0b1111 | 0b1000 is 0b1111)