Rotational bitwise shift

[rabidusv]

As I understand it, the unsigned long type is 4 bytes. Also, the bitwise shift (<<) is a zero-fill shift as opposed to a rotational shift. However when I shift, the value seems to be rotating, as opposed to being lost as I would expect.

Anybody have any ideas?

char resBuffer[sizeof(unsigned long)];
 
unsigned long value=1;
 
memcpy(resBuffer, &value, sizeof(unsigned long));
 
 
 

Leaves resBuffer = { 1, 0, 0, 0 } as I would expect.

char resBuffer[sizeof(unsigned long)];
 
unsigned long value=1;
 
value = (value << 8);
 
memcpy(resBuffer, &value, sizeof(unsigned long));
 
 
 

Leaves resBuffer = { 0, 1, 0, 0 } as I would expect.

char resBuffer[sizeof(unsigned long)];
 
unsigned long value=1;
 
value = (value << 36);
 
memcpy(resBuffer, &value, sizeof(unsigned long));
 
 
 

However, leaves resBuffer = { 16, 0, 0, 0 }

Why isn't the result { 0, 0, 0, 0 } as I would expect?

Thanks for taking the time to read through this!

[Banfa]

I believe you may be running into undefined behaviour (I just can't actually find anyway that categorically states it) with

value = (value << 36);

because you are shifting more bits than is in an unsigned long (32) in this case.

If this is the case then having invoked undefined behaviour the compiler is free to do whatever it wants, on my system it looks like what it does is shift by (shift % 32), for 36 this results in a left shift by 4.

Anyway you should not rely on undefined behaviour because (being undefined) it can change by platform, compiler or even compiler version.