From: Han Holl <han.holl@...>
Date: 2002-06-01T21:09:54+09:00
Subject: Reading binary files (or strings)


Hi,

I need decode a binary file, (small enough to fit in memory).
At the present I have code like this:

class Dotqread
  def initialize(fn)
    @blob = File.open(fn).read
  end
  def wordread
    a = @blob.unpack("s")[0]
    @blob = @blob[2..-1]
    a
  end
   def longread
    a = @blob.unpack("L")[0]
    @blob = @blob[4..-1]
    a
  end
  def txtread
    a = wordread
    r = Opstring.new @blob[0...a]
    @blob = @blob[a..-1] if a > 0
    r
  end
......

but as you can imagine performance is horrible.
What I seem to need is either:
    string.unpack(format, offset)    ## which I couldn.t find, but 
should be easy to hack,
or:
    iostream.unpack(format)   ## not found either.

Is there another way to do what I want ? Did I miss some library ?

Cheers,

Han Holl