1

Can a binary file created by a .NET program be read by Python and vice versa?

Which data types would be compatible for this?

Example VB.NET program:

Sub Main()
    Using writer As New System.IO.BinaryWriter( _
    System.IO.File.Open("Test.bin", IO.FileMode.Create))
        writer.Write(True)
        writer.Write(123)
        writer.Write(123.456)
        writer.Write(987.654D)
        writer.Write("Test string.")
    End Using
    Using reader As New System.IO.BinaryReader( _
    System.IO.File.Open("Test.bin", IO.FileMode.Open))
        Console.WriteLine(reader.ReadBoolean())
        Console.WriteLine(reader.ReadInt32())
        Console.WriteLine(reader.ReadDouble())
        Console.WriteLine(reader.ReadDecimal())
        Console.WriteLine(reader.ReadString())
    End Using
    Console.Write("Press <RETURN> to exit.")
    Console.ReadKey()
End Sub
Improve this question
4
  • How is this different than your question from 30 mins ago? Commented Oct 18, 2015 at 19:07
  • @Plutonix That was really two questions and I split them. Commented Oct 18, 2015 at 19:08
  • you can use pythonnet on python side to load binary data from .net Commented Dec 14, 2015 at 6:45
  • but better solution would be to use something like Google Protocol Buffers Commented Dec 14, 2015 at 6:46

1 Answer 1

Reset to default
1

It's very unlikely that Python uses identical conventions for storing binary data.

Issues to be aware of include everything from endianess to how data structures are laid out. Intel CPUs use least-significant bit ordering, the TCP/IP network protocol and many non-Intel CPUs including the CPUs that UNIX traditionally ran on, use most-significant bit ordering. A platform-agnostic system like .NET will stick with one ordering when it writes binary files. So .NET will be compatible with itself whether it's running on a Core i7 or ARM or some other CPU. But even if Python consistently uses the same ordering as .NET, it's just completely unlikely that it is going to lay out data types and data structures the same way.

This leaves you in the position if needing to use a compatible file IO library on both platforms, which is more work than you want to sign up for.

Fortunately, there are libraries available for your use. See this answer for one example.

Of course, the modern friendly way to do this sort of thing is to write out a delimited text file in a format like XML or JSON. Or, if you're dealing with very large data sets, just use a database.

Improve this answer
Sign up to request clarification or add additional context in comments.

Comments

Your Answer

By clicking “Post Your Answer”, you agree to our terms of service and acknowledge you have read our privacy policy.

Start asking to get answers

Find the answer to your question by asking.

Ask question

Explore related questions

See similar questions with these tags.