Evaluate a Hexadecimal Bitwise AND
Company: Akuna Capital
Role: Software Engineer
Category: Software Engineering Fundamentals
Difficulty: medium
Interview Round: Technical Screen
# Evaluate a Hexadecimal Bitwise AND
Compute the bitwise expression `0x23 & 0x34`. Show both hexadecimal values in an aligned binary representation, apply AND bit by bit, and return the result in hexadecimal.
Explain why a result bit is set and how the grouping of binary digits maps back to hexadecimal.
### What a Strong Answer Covers
- Correct four-bit expansion of each hexadecimal digit.
- Alignment of equal place values before applying AND.
- The rule that an output bit is one only when both input bits are one.
- Correct conversion of the result back to hexadecimal.
### Follow-up Questions
- What are the results of `0x23 | 0x34` and `0x23 ^ 0x34`?
- How does integer width affect the result of bitwise NOT on `0x23`?
Overview: Evaluate a hexadecimal bitwise AND by expanding aligned nibbles into binary and applying the per-bit truth rule. The worked solution converts `0x23` and `0x34`, identifies their single shared set bit, and returns the exact result `0x20`.
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