From: khaines@...
Date: 2007-09-05T08:07:37+09:00
Subject: Re: Socket send functions only allow you to send strings?

On Wed, 5 Sep 2007, Ryan Parmeter wrote:

> As far as I can tell, my only option to write to a UDPSocket is to use
> the send method, which takes a string.  I need to send a 32bit integer
> representing the date in a UDP packet and I'd love to use something
> like:
>
> myUDPsocket.send( Time.now.to_i, 0, host, port)
>
> In my situation I can't change the receiving program to accept a string
> or I could do it that way. I can't convert the integer to a string
> either because that would blow my 32 bit requirement.  Does anyone have
> any idea?

A string is just a sequence of bytes.  It can be anything.

In your case, you need to encode a decimal number as returned by 
Time.now.to_i into 32 bits.

myUDPsocket.send( [Time.now.to_i].pack('i') )

That may be what you need.

http://ruby-doc.org/core/classes/Array.html#M002245

For more information.


Kirk Haines