What does this mean? (&)

In a previous post, we explained how the pipe (|) symbol can have different meanings depending on context in Python. This guide provides similar details but for the ampersand (&) symbol.

1.Intersection

When & is used on sets, it performs an intersection operation and returns a set that contains items that are present in both sets.
[*]snip

x =  {1,2,3,4} 
y = {2,6,8,9}
print(x & y)

[*]Output
{2}

2.Logical AND:

When & is used on boolean values(i.e. True and False), it performs a logical AND operation. AND returns True if both of the operands are True, and False otherwise
[*]snip

True & True
False & True
False & False

[*]Output
True
False
False

The above is the same as using the ‘and’ operator as show below:
[*]snip

True and True
False and True
False and False

[*]Output
True
False
False

3. Bitwise AND:

When & is used on integer values, is performs a bitwise AND operation. The integers are converted to binary format and operations are performed on each bit and the results are then returned in decimal format. Bitwise AND returns 1 if both the bits are 1 else 0.

[*]snip

12 & 7

[*]Output
4

Explanation:

12 = 1100 (Binary format)
7 = 0111 (Binary format)

12&7 = 0100 (Binary)
>>> int(‘0100’, 2)
4

We used int(‘0100’, 2) to convert binary to decimal. (f”{12:b}”) converts an integer to binary.

The bits are compared to attain a value of ‘0100’ which is later converted to decimal(4)

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