(Please I know this has been covered but...) Open, Save Binary, convert to/from Hex

[KillemAll]

Please I am begging. I have looked through so many articles and so many discussions that my eyes are about to cross. I can not get this to work. I am trying to open a file with a .bin extention. I assume it is binary, right? It opens in a hex editor just fine. I want to be able to open it, read certain chunks of data and display them as Hexadecimal, take options and selections from the user as hex data combine everything in a specific order and write it out as a new binary file. The binary files are relatively small at 4k per file. What I am having a problem with is this. I open the file for binary just like I read. when I look at the value it is in some kind of extended ascii format or something. I thought it was supposed to be 1's and 0's? It really wouldnt matter to me what it was since all I want to deal with is hex and let a conversion code handle the going back and fourth between bin and hex. So I have tried almost every single code sample I can find for (and there are plenty of them). But all of them fail and give me errors. I assume it is because they are expecting to see 1's and 0's and instead are being passed those extended ascii or whatever they are. Is it obvious what I am I doing wrong? Any pointers would be greatly appreciated. or a code sample of reading 1 byte from binary and showing as a two char hex string would be awesome.

Thanks in Advance for any help,
Richard

[michelle]

Hello KillemAll,

The extention of a file is saying nothing about what kind of file it is.
The content of a file is allways hexadecimal.
It is the program what is establishing what to do with the file content.
Every time you reading the smallest part of the file, it is a byte!
If you want to make bits of it, you have to convert it.

I do hope this will help you.
If I don't understand your question please say with other words, maybe I can help you.

Nice regards,

Michelle.

[kedaman]

A file is always a file, it's how you read it that will decide what format it is.
a "binary" file is probably a file stored with binary contents of variables so yes, binary is the correct
method to read that file. I assume you don't have any specific variables known there so you may load it into a byte array

Dim buffer() as byte
Open filepath for binary as #1
  Get#1,,buffer
close #1
debug.print "The hex value of the 42'nd byte in the file is: " & Hex(buffer(42))

Now the last line will show you how to convert it to hex, you use Hex() function.
Also if you want to convert a string character to hex then use Hex(ASc())

[KillemAll]

This may not be the best way but it does appear to work properly. It was returning some hex values as only one char so I had to get it to buffer with a leading 0 for those. I have not tried converting back from the hex value to the Binary value. I think I understand enough now to get it to work though. If you think this code could be done better please let me know.

Thanks,
Richard

'<-------Begin Code------->
Const ChunkSize = 1
Dim Data As String
Dim HexData As String

Public Sub Form_Load()
Me.Show
Open "C:\Test.bin" For Binary As #1
Do Until LOF(1) = Loc(1) Or EOF(1)
Data = ""
If LOF(1) - Loc(1) < ChunkSize Then
Data = String(LOF(1) - Loc(1), 0)
Else
Data = String(ChunkSize, 0)
End If
Get #1, , Data
If Len(Hex(Asc(Data))) = 1 Then
HexData = "0" & Hex(Asc(Data)) & " "
ElseIf Len(Hex(Asc(Data))) = 2 Then
HexData = Hex(Asc(Data)) & " "
Else
MsgBox "(" & Hex(Asc(Data)) & ") was returned", vbExclamation, "There was an error"
End If
Text1.Text = Text1.Text & HexData
Loop
End Sub
'<-------End Code------->

[KillemAll]

This one does both the reads and writes. You could modify the hex values of the array of strings between the read and save, but this was just getting the basic conversions down. No dlls, no long modules for the conversion, no exotic formulas, you use the Hex(Asc()) to convert from that extended ascii type character that the "Open filename for Binary As ..." command returns to decimal and then hex. store each one in an array of strings and then use Chr(Val("&H" & )) to convert back from hex to decimal and then from decimal back to the extended ascii character type. works like a champ.

Thanks again,
Richard

'<-------Begin Code------->
Dim Data As String
Dim HexData As String
Dim HexArray(4095) As String * 2

Private Sub cmdDisplay_Click()
Dim iCount As Integer
For iCount = 0 To 4095
Text1.Text = Text1.Text & HexArray(iCount) & " "
Next iCount
End Sub

Public Sub cmdRead_Click()
Open "C:\Test.bin" For Binary As #1
Do Until LOF(1) = Loc(1) Or EOF(1)
Data = ""
Data = String(1, 0)
Get #1, , Data
If Len(Hex(Asc(Data))) = 1 Then
HexData = "0" & Hex(Asc(Data))
ElseIf Len(Hex(Asc(Data))) = 2 Then
HexData = Hex(Asc(Data))
Else
MsgBox "(" & Hex(Asc(Data)) & ") was returned", vbExclamation, "There was an error"
Exit Sub
End If
HexArray(Loc(1) - 1) = HexData
Loop
End Sub

Private Sub cmdSave_Click()
Open "C:\New.bin" For Binary As #2
Dim iCount As Integer
For iCount = 0 To 4095
Dim binstring2 As String * 1
binstring2 = Chr(Val("&H" & HexArray(iCount)))
Put #2, , binstring2
Next iCount
End Sub

'<-------End Code------->

Again, I am sure there is probably a more efficient way to do some of it but this worked for me. Btw, if you try this code you should set the text1.multiline true and the text1.font to fixedsys.

[kedaman]

Private Sub cmdDisplay_Click()
    Dim icount As Integer, temp As String
    For icount = 0 To 4095
        temp = temp & HexArray(icount) & " " 'Now it would be even faster with Copymemory
    Next icount
    text1 = temp
End Sub

Private Sub cmdSave_Click()
Dim Binarray(4095) As Byte, icount As Integer
    For icount = 0 To 4095 'A byte array instead
        Binarray(icount) = Val("&H" & HexArray(icount))
    Next icount
    Open "C:\New.bin" For Binary As #2
        Put #2, , Binarray 'This is a lot faster than putting a byte one by one
    Close #2
End Sub

Here's some improovement i did for your cmdSave and cmdDisplay functions, well cmdread should also be done with a byte array instead...

[KillemAll]

Thanks,
You are "The Man". I appreciate the constructive feedback.