binmode() - Opening Files for Binary Input

<< Open Files in Binary Mode

<< Perl Tutorials - Herong's Tutorial Examples

This section describes steps on how to open file for binary input using open(), binmode() and read() functions.

If you want to open a file and read its content in binary mode, you should use the following functions:

• open() to open the file to a file handle.
• binmode() to set the file handle to binary mode.
• read() to read data from the file handle.
• close() to close the file handle.

Descriptions and sample codes of open() and close() are in the previous chapter.

The syntax of binmode() is very simple:

   binmode(file_handle);

The syntax of read() is more complex:

rc = read(file_handle, buffer, length, offset);
rc = read(file_handle, buffer, length);

where "buffer" is a scalar variable where the inputted bytes will be stored; "length" is the number of bytes requested to be inputted; "rc" is the actual number of bytes inputted; "offset" is an optional value to specify where in the scalar variable to begin to store the inputted bytes.

Sections in This Chapter

binmode() - Opening Files for Binary Input

binmode() - Opening Files for Binary Output

Copy.pl - Copying Binary Files

Bin2Hex.pl - Converting Binary Data to Hex Numbers