Declaring an unsigned int in Java

Question

Is there a way to declare an unsigned int in Java?

Or the question may be framed as this as well: What is the Java equivalent of unsigned?

Just to tell you the context I was looking at Java's implementation of String.hashcode(). I wanted to test the possibility of collision if the integer were 32 unsigned int.

Answer 1

Java does not have a datatype for unsigned integers.

You can define a long instead of an int if you need to store large values.

You can also use a signed integer as if it were unsigned. The benefit of two's complement representation is that most operations (such as addition, subtraction, multiplication, and left shift) are identical on a binary level for signed and unsigned integers. A few operations (division, right shift, comparison, and casting), however, are different. As of Java SE 8, new methods in the Integer class allow you to fully use the int data type to perform unsigned arithmetic:

In Java SE 8 and later, you can use the int data type to represent an unsigned 32-bit integer, which has a minimum value of 0 and a maximum value of 2^32-1. Use the Integer class to use int data type as an unsigned integer. Static methods like compareUnsigned, divideUnsigned etc have been added to the Integer class to support the arithmetic operations for unsigned integers.

Note that int variables are still signed when declared but unsigned arithmetic is now possible by using those methods in the Integer class.

Answer 2

There is an API for unsigned Integer and Long in Java 8!

Answer 3

Whether a value in an int is signed or unsigned depends on how the bits are interpreted - Java interprets bits as a signed value (it doesn't have unsigned primitives).

If you have an int that you want to interpret as an unsigned value (e.g. you read an int from a DataInputStream that you know contains an unsigned value) then you can do the following trick.

int fourBytesIJustRead = someObject.getInt();
long unsignedValue = fourBytesIJustRead & 0xffffffffl;

Note, that it is important that the hex literal is a long literal, not an int literal - hence the 'l' at the end.

Answer 4

We needed unsigned numbers to model MySQL's unsigned TINYINT, SMALLINT, INT, BIGINT in jOOQ, which is why we have created jOOU, a minimalistic library offering wrapper types for unsigned integer numbers in Java. Example:

import static org.joou.Unsigned.*;

// and then...
UByte    b = ubyte(1);
UShort   s = ushort(1);
UInteger i = uint(1);
ULong    l = ulong(1);

All of these types extend java.lang.Number and can be converted into higher-order primitive types and BigInteger. Hope this helps.

(Disclaimer: I work for the company behind these libraries)

Answer 5

For unsigned numbers you can use these classes from Guava library:

• UnsignedInteger
• UnsignedLong

They support various operations:

• plus
• minus
• times
• mod
• dividedBy

The thing that seems missing at the moment are byte shift operators. If you need those you can use BigInteger from Java.

Answer 6

Use char for 16 bit unsigned integers.

Answer 7

It seems that you can handle the signing problem by doing a "logical AND" on the values before you use them:

Example (Value of byte[] header[0] is 0x86 ):

System.out.println("Integer "+(int)header[0]+" = "+((int)header[0]&0xff));

Result:

Integer -122 = 134

Answer 8

Perhaps this is what you meant?

long getUnsigned(int signed) {
    return signed >= 0 ? signed : 2 * (long) Integer.MAX_VALUE + 2 + signed;
}

• getUnsigned(0) → 0
• getUnsigned(1) → 1
• getUnsigned(Integer.MAX_VALUE) → 2147483647
• getUnsigned(Integer.MIN_VALUE) → 2147483648
• getUnsigned(Integer.MIN_VALUE + 1) → 2147483649

Answer 9

Just made this piece of code, wich converts "this.altura" from negative to positive number. Hope this helps someone in need

       if(this.altura < 0){    

                        String aux = Integer.toString(this.altura);
                        char aux2[] = aux.toCharArray();
                        aux = "";
                        for(int con = 1; con < aux2.length; con++){
                            aux += aux2[con];
                        }
                        this.altura = Integer.parseInt(aux);
                        System.out.println("New Value: " + this.altura);
                    }

Answer 10

You can use the Math.abs(number) function. It returns a positive number.