# Operators

Operators are reserved characters (and combinations of
adjacent characters) and can be referenced individually by their respective
symbol.

Expressions are formed by combining operators with variables,
constants, or functions. When an expression is encountered as part
of a BASIC program statement, it is evaluated by
performing the operations specified by each of the operators on the
adjacent operands.

Each operator has a precedence rating and,
in any given expression, the highest precedence operation is performed
first. 0 is the highest precedence and 8 is the lowest. If there are
two or more operators with the same precedence or if an operator displays
more than once, the leftmost operation is performed first. Precedence
of the operators is as follows:

| Operator | Operation | Precedence |
| --- | --- | --- |
| ( ) | Express evaluation | 0 - highest |
| [ ] | Substring extraction | 0 |
| ^ ** | Exponent | 1 |
| - | Unary minus | 2 |
| * | Multiplication | 3 |
| / | Division | 3 |
| + | Addition | 4 |
| - | Subtraction | 4 |
| expr | Format string | 5 |
| cat (:) | Concatenate | 6 |
| = # <> >= | Relational operators | 7 |
| match | Pattern matching | 7 |
| and & or ! | Logical operators | 8 - lowest |
Parentheses can be used anywhere to clarify evaluation,
even if they do not change the order. An expression enclosed in parentheses
as a whole has highest precedence and is evaluated first. Within the
parentheses, the rules of precedence apply.

The function associated
with the `*=`, `+=`, `-=`, `/=` assignment operators occurs after all left
side operations and before the assignment.

See the individual
entries for each operator and the entries logical operators, operators,
match relational operator, precedence, relational operators, and special
characters.

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Source: https://d3codex.com/pickbasic-flashbasic/operators/ - part of the D3Codex reference.