[Python-ideas] String and bytes bitwise operations

[Ken Hilton]

Hi all,

We all know the bitwise operators: & (and), | (or), ^ (xor), and ~ (not).
We know how they work with numbers:

420 ^ 502

110100100
111110110
== XOR ==
001010010
= 82

But it might be useful in some cases to (let's say) xor a string (or
bytestring):

HELLO ^ world

01001000 01000101 01001100 01001100 01001111
01110111 01101111 01110010 01101100 01100100
=================== XOR ====================
00111111 00101010 00111110 00100000 00101011
= ?*> +

Currently, that's done with this expression for strings:

    >>> ''.join(chr(ord(a) ^ ord(b)) for a, b in zip('HELLO', 'world'))
    '?*> +'

and this expression for bytestrings:

    >>> bytes(a ^ b for a, b in zip(b'HELLO', b'world'))
    b'?*> +'

It would be much more convenient, however, to allow a simple xor of a
string:

    >>> 'HELLO' ^ 'world'
    '?*> +'

or bytestring:

    >>> b'HELLO' ^ b'world'
    b'?*> +'

(All of this applies to other bitwise operators, of course.)
Compatibility issues are a no-brainer - currently, bitwise operators for
strings raise TypeErrors.

Thanks.

Suggesting,
Ken
​ Hilton​
;
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