Bitwise checking problem with PHP code in plugin

[thalamus]

After checking other methods, I still can't seem to get the code to pick up a bitwise condition on the value.

So if it can't be done, does anyone have any ideas as to how I can define instructions within a plugin, based upon the bit-values of custom profile fields?

i.e.:
Custom Profile Fields set to a multiple selection box (call it Languages Spoken), users can select more than one that they can speak (i.e. English, French, German). These are called "field5".

Based on this, a plugin would pick up the value of 'field5' and check the bits set in the value (see which languages were selected) and, based on this value, a country flag is placed in the user's profile information bit on the forum posts. Therefore, if a user selectes english (bit 1), French (bit 2) and German (bit 3) = 1+2+4 then the userpostbit (say under the number of posts made by user) says "Languages: " then the UK, FR and DE flags are displayed.

As I said I know this can be done with a direct edit of the postbit/postbit_legacy template, but surely there has to be a way to place this into a plugin, in order to minimize direct edits of the default templates? Or is this simply not incorporated yet into the vbulletin plugin facilities/functions?