Char with negative showing ?

[Srinivas Redd]

The following code after running showing the output as b=?
Can anybody tell me why is this happening ???/

import java.lang.*;

class FirstClass
{
char b= (char)-10;

void print()
{

System.out.println("b "+b);
}

}



class Run
{
public static void main(String argsv[])
{
FirstClass FC = new FirstClass();
FC.print();
}
}

[Keith Lynn]

This is the bit represenation of -10.

11111111111111111111111111110110

When it's converted to a char, you get the last two bytes. I believe the reason it's printing ? is that the last two bytes represent a character your machine can't display.

[Srinivas Redd]

Hi ,

Thanks for your answer.
I agree that the char takes the last two bytes from the 2's compliment value of -10 . It could be some big value like 65535 in decimals9base 10)....

Here I guess , it would do some mod operation on 65535 and then changes to some value less than 256 ,which can be printable. Am I correct.

Thanks in advance.
Srinivas Reddy

[Keith Lynn]

No I don't think it mods by 256. Large UNICODE values are probably used for characters of other languages or aren't used now.

[Srinivas Redd]

Hi Lynn,

Yes I agree ..... Thanks for your information.

Srinivas Reddy