What is "~" operator in Java

Question

Can someone help to explain what "~" does in Java? I searched but couldn't find the answers as I don't know what ~ is called. Thanks in advance. Below is an example from an open source stego program called Snow.

private int     tabpos (int n) {
    return ((n + 8) & ~7);
}

Bit wise negation I believe. So in this case, all but the smallest 3 bits are zero in `~7`. — abiessu, Apr 09 '15 at 01:05
check out [the answer to this question](http://stackoverflow.com/questions/791328/how-does-the-bitwise-complement-operator-work) — LinkBerest, Apr 09 '15 at 01:08

score 3 · Accepted Answer · answered Apr 09 '15 at 01:12

From Oracle documentation:

The unary bitwise complement operator "~" inverts a bit pattern; it can be applied to any of the integral types, making every "0" a "1" and every "1" a "0". For example, a byte contains 8 bits; applying this operator to a value whose bit pattern is "00000000" would change its pattern to "11111111".

Reference: Bitwise and Bit Shift Operators

What is "~" operator in Java

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