In computing and telecommunications, bit inversion refers to the changing of the state of a bit or binary number to the opposite state, for example changing a 0 bit to 1 or vice versa. It is often represented with a tilde (~). It also refers to the changing of a state representing a given bit to the opposite state.
Usage in computing
Many popular programming languages implement bit inversion as an operation. For example, in JavaScript, bit inversion is known as a 'bitwise NOT' and is implemented as seen below:
var a = 2; var b = ~ a;
In this example, a is a 32-bit signed integer and in binary would be . Variable is the bit inversion of variable and equals (−3 in decimal).
In Python: >>> a = 2 >>> b = ~ a >>> b -3
References
See also Bitwise operation Bit error Two's complement