# ignoring overflow in two's complement addition of numbers with different signs[specific case]

I understand the rule says that overflow cannot happen for two's complement addition of numbers with different signs, but do not understand why this specific case does not cause overflow:

 1001010
+0010101
--------
1011111


Am I simply misunderstanding the actual rule or missing a step somewhere? Thanks in advance!

EDIT: removed an extra 1 in the result

• 1/ carry out does not imply 2's complement overflow. 2/ the two MSB are 0, I don't think there is a carry out in your example May 1, 2017 at 11:50
• Sorry, the carry was a mistake, fixed now! May 1, 2017 at 12:30

Okay, let's take a look at your example:

 1001010
+0010101
--------
1011111


Your numbers here only have 7 bits, so we have a smaller range than we typically deal with. Nevertheless:

$1001010$ is

$-64 + 8 + 2$, which is $-54$.

$0010101$ is

$16 + 4 + 1$, which is $21$.

$21-54$ is $-33$. Let's see whether our answer matches up:

$1011111$ is

$-64+16+8+4+2+1$, which is $-33$.

An intuitive way to think about this is that the number space is divided entirely in half (with $0$ acting as a positive number). So, with the standard 8 bits, your numbers range from $-128$ to $127$. There is no positive number from within that set that you could add to a negative number from that set and get a number either above $127$ or below $-128$.

• This clears up a lot! however, how can the last two bits be different and there not be overflow? would the length of the sum need to be 1 longer than the largest number added for there to be a overflow? May 1, 2017 at 13:12
• I'm not sure you're correctly defining overflow. Overflow is when you switch sign inappropriately. A positive plus a negative can be positive or negative, but a negative plus a negative (hypothetically) can only be negative. But with limited bits, we can run into trouble. If we add a negative plus a negative and end up with a positive, obviously something has gone wrong. That's where the word overflow comes in. May 1, 2017 at 15:17