Working with bits

Hi All,

Most of the configuration for the Cochran is stored in bits and I'm wondering how experience programmers would handle this. Here's a sense of the data:

short int a5 consists of byte 0 : alarm clock minute byte 1, bit 7: alarm clock on byte 1, bits 6-0: alarm clock hour

There are also 3 and 4 bit integers stored in bytes.

Finally there are decimals stored as byte 0: decimal fraction * 256 byte 1: integer portion

I can create a function that extracts the bits into handy to use values and another to insert the bits back in. I can also use a struct with bit positions.

What would you suggest is the best and portable way to handle this?

Thanks