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Binary Shifts

A binary shift is a technique for performing multiplication or division on a binary number.

Binary shift

Binary shift

  • In a binary shift, each digit is moved one column to the left or the right.
  • Extra 0 bits are added to the start or end of the binary number to fill any missing spaces.
Left binary shift

Left binary shift

  • In a left binary shift, each digit is moved one place to the left.
    • This has the effect of multiplying the number by two.
  • You must take care, when performing a left shift, that there is no overflow error (where we run out of space to store the last digit of the number).
Right binary shift

Right binary shift

  • In a right binary shift, each digit is moved one place to the right.
    • This has the effect of dividing the number by two.
  • You must take care when performing a right shift that no data is shifted off the right hand side. This can cause a loss of accuracy.
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