VB Operators

An operator is a code element that performs an operation on one or more code elements that hold values.  The value elements include variables, constants, literals, properties, returns from Function and Operator procedures, and expressions.  MSDN - Operators and Expressions in Visual Basic

In Visual Basic the assignment operator is the single equal sign.

Arithmetic operators

Operator	Use	Example
^	Exponentiation	2 ^ 3 is eight, exponent may be a   floating point number   8 ^ 2.5 is 181.02
-	Negation (used to reverse the sign   of the given value, exp -intValue)	-(-2) is two
*	Multiplication	3 * 4 is twelve
/	Floating point Division	8 / 3 is 2.66666...
\	Integer Division	8 \ 3 is 2
Mod	Modulus Arithmetic	11 mod 3 is 2
+	Addition	2 + 3 is five
-	Subtraction	7 - 3 is four

 

String concatenation operators

The ampersand character (&) is most often used to join string text. If numeric values are assigned to a string, then the result of the & and + will differ as shown in the example.

Operator	Use	Example
+	String Concatenation	strVal = "I"   + " " + "love"   + " " + "bananas."   strVal = 10 + (8 * 2.5) ' strVal is "30"
&	String Concatenation	strVal = "I"   & " love " & "bananas." (same as above)   strVal = 10 & (8 * 2.5) ' strVal is "1020"

 

Comparison operators

Operator	Use
=	Equality
<>	Inequality
<	Less than
>	Greater than
>=	Greater than or equal to
<=	Less than or equal to

 

Logical operators

Operator	Use
Not	Negation
And	Conjunction
AndAlso	Conjunction
Or	Disjunction
OrElse	Disjunction
Xor	Disjunction

 

The two new logical operators in VB.NET are AndAlso and OrElse and they are similar to the And and Or but do more. 

The AndAlso operator will determine first if the left operand is true or false.  If it is false, the expression does not bother evaluating the operand on the right.  This is a kind of short-circuit that can save your program some processing time and possibly prevent errors.  In this example the AndAlso determines that intVar1 < 10 is false, and so not bother prompting for a value for intVar2.  If instead of the AndAlso operator, the And operator was used, then the user will be prompted for a value each time.

                       

Similarly the OrElse operator determines if the first operand is true, and if it is, not bother evaluating the second operand.

Binary operators

Binary operators << and >> perform arithmetic shifting of integer-type numbers.  Arithmetic shifting means that the bit that is shifted off either end of the number does not reappear at the other end.  A form of bit-shifting called circular shifting is not directly supported by VB.NET.