Who is this article for exactly? It starts off by trying to relate to the reader by presenting the point about learning a new programming language, but then goes on to explain one of the most fundamental concepts of computing, as if the reader is a complete novice. I would imagine that nearly every person with programming experience, whether that be formal or not, would have at least some familiarity with binary representation and bitwise operations.
> would have at least some familiarity with binary representation and bitwise operations.
There's a whole generation of programmers that aren't interested in, and don't need, "low level" bitwise operations. I would claim that's a "good thing", since it means they're letting someone else do the "boring stuff" by using libraries, allowing them to spend more time solving higher level problems.
When I was going to school, some sort of assembler was the first language you learned. These days, it's usually Python or Java. With a "not real programmers" silliness aside, I hope the tedium continues to decline, and is left for those interested in it, increasing productivity for everyone.
> There's a whole generation of programmers that aren't interested in, and don't need, "low level" bitwise operations.
But it's worth understanding them even if you never need to use them. Much like understanding how a computer works at a low level, that kind of knowledge helps contextualize higher-level things and puts additional tools in your toolbox.
This seems to be addressed to people who want to hack game emulators for early game machines. So they cover the basics and then go on to a game emulator example.
In modern programming, bit-banging can usually be avoided. C++ and Rust both have bit fields in structs, and generics for sets of bits. If you're working on some data structure with AND, OR, and shift operations, that's kind of retro today. The compiler is probably better at doing that stuff than you are.
I think gp means GFX like graphic design as opposed to university computer science. At the UI layer those skills are more use than understanding bitwise
operations.
