issues using stringstream to handle binary file

Question

I'm working with a binary file that I need to grab its useful contents from. The structure is:

Doesn't feel like stringstream is very well suited to deal with binary files. — Mats Petersson
– Mats Petersson, Commented Sep 6, 2013 at 14:50
The problem isn't stringstream (although I don't see any real use for it here); the problem is that he's trying to use formatted IO on binary data. There's no way that will work, since the formatting is all text oriented. — James Kanze
– James Kanze, Commented Sep 6, 2013 at 14:53
It's not clear what the actual input looks like. What's binary, and what is text? And if most of the file is binary, null is 0, which is a valid binary value. — James Kanze
– James Kanze, Commented Sep 6, 2013 at 14:55
@JamesKanze agreed. without a much better definition of the input file format this is somewhat nebulous in the first place. — WhozCraig
– WhozCraig, Commented Sep 6, 2013 at 15:01

zennehoy · Accepted Answer · 2013-09-06 15:21:08Z

2

Based on a quick look at the file, you don't have an "unknown amt of nulls" anywhere. The format appears to be:

N Bytes: number of animals, integer as text delimited by '\n'
24 Bytes per animal:
    16 Bytes: name of animal padded with 0
    4 Bytes: some 32 bit number (little endian)
    4 Bytes: another 32 bit number (little endian)

You shouldn't be reading this as a text file, but instead as a raw binary file. There's absolutely no need for a stringstream, you can simply parse the number of animals by reading in one byte at a time and adding to the previous value * 10 until you reach '\n'.

edited Sep 6, 2013 at 15:21

answered Sep 6, 2013 at 15:09

zennehoy

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