Numeric Literal Values

Java 7 has added a new feature, binary literals for integer number types (byte, short, int, and long.) Before we can get excited about this, we need to know what that means. In earlier versions of Java, we have had several other types of literal value.

Let's Get Literal

What is a "literal"? A literal is an explicit value. For example, in this line:
int number=123;
the value 123 is a "literal". Since it's a normal base-10 value, we might say it is a "decimal literal". Decimal values don't have to be marked in any special way.

A hexadecimal literal looks like this:
int number=0x007b;
The value 0x007b is a hexadecimal (base 16) number that is expressed literally (stated explicitly.) The 0x at the beginning is what marks it as a hexadecimal value. The leading zero shows that it's a numerical value, not a variable name or keyword or something like that. The x marks it as a hexadecimal number.

Hexadecimal numbers take binary values four bits at a time (a bit is a single one or zero value) and puts them into a single digit. Octal (base 8) digits each represent the values of three bits.

To tell Java you're using an octal value, place a leading zero in front of the number itself:
int number=0173;
Here the number 0173 is an octal value equal to 123 in decimal. If we accidentally put a zero in front of a decimal integer, we'll either get an error (if we use the digits 8 or 9 in that number) or the value will be interpreted incorrectly. For example, if we want to put the value of one hundred twenty-three into a variable, but instead of the line we have above we accidentally add a zero, like this:
int number=0123;
The value of the number will be interpreted as eighty-three, not one hundred twenty-three. So watch out for that.

New for Java 7--Binary Literals
In Java 7 we get a new ability, the use of binary numbers. Since you know that you can encode binary values into both octal and hex either three or four bits at a time, this may not seem like a really big deal. In fact, there's been a request to add this feature to Java for a long time, but it's been low priority.

But now it's finally here.

So you can define values as individual bits, like this:
int number=0b01111011;
That's the binary for one hundred twenty-three, by the way. Why is this important?

As Java becomes more mature, and more widely used, it is used in more places. Over time, high level languages that deal with things at a very abstract level tend to get used in more situations where it is nice to have the high level features while also having the ability to have low level control or simulation of the actual computer hardware. In cases like these, it is nice to be able to manipulate single bits in places where they represent specific individual signals in the computer system or simulation.

For example, let's say we want to recreate an old 1980s computer in a Java program, like a Commodore 64. The Commodore 64 reads several signal lines directly on its joystick ports. We want to be able to simulate the behavior of these ports so that we can play old C-64 games in our simulation. Each of the lines represents a switch in the joystick. So we may take a particular keypress and represent it as the following binary value:

byte stick_up=0b00001;

In this case, we show it setting the lowest order bit. We might have another like this:

byte fire_switch=0b100000;

Since these each equate to specific electrical signals that get "turned into bits" in the C-64's CIA chip, it's nice to be able to tell them to Java as bits. We could have used hex or octal, but it's a bit nicer to see them as individual bits.