How to bitwise shift in VB.NET?

Question

How do I bitwise shift right/left in VB.NET? Does it even have operators for this, or do I have to use some utility method?

Answer 1

VB.NET has had bit shift operators (<< and >>) since 2003.

Answer 2

You can use the << and >> operators, and you have to specify how many bits to shift.

myFinal = myInteger << 4   ' Shift LEFT by 4 bits.
myFinal = myInteger >> 4   ' Shift RIGHT by 4 bits.

You can also use it as a unary operator...

myFinal <<= 4     ' Shift myFinal LEFT by 4 bits, storing the result in myFinal.
myFinal >>= 4     ' Shift myFinal RIGHT by 4 bits, storing the result in myFinal.