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Full Discussion: Converting binary file to text file
Top Forums UNIX for Dummies Questions & Answers Converting binary file to text file Post 302965057 by bakunin on Friday 22nd of January 2016 06:12:47 PM
Old 01-22-2016
Quote:
Originally Posted by dp0b
Im wondering how I can convert a binary file to a text file?
What a "binary file" and what a "text file" is is primarily determined by the files contents. So there is no "conversion" between the two, like "convert CSV to Excel format". The latter is just two representations of the same thing - tabular data - but the former are simply different types of contents.

There are (today rather unusual) meanings of "text file" as containing compiled code (calling a relocatible object file before linking "text" was the IBM speak of the seventies) and if you are using the term this way you will have to use a linker. If you are using "text" in the more common meaning of "sequences of characters transporting meaning to a reading human" then there is no (common!) way to transform one into the other.

There are of course programs which use binary representations for text files (simpliest example is a packing program which packs a text file into something binary). In such a case you need to specifically reverse the algorithm (i.e use an unpack-program to restore the text file), but this means to know the used algorithm first. And even this only works if a text file was packed beforehand. Put a binary file in and another binary file will come out, packing or no packing.

If you want to search for text parts inside a binary file, this is possible: use the strings command to list readable strings within otherwise binary files:

Code:
strings /path/to/file

I hope this helps.

bakunin
 

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LEARN ABOUT DEBIAN

cdtoa

CDTOA(1)						      General Commands Manual							  CDTOA(1)

NAME

       cdtoa - To convert the binary format of a dictionary back to
	       text format.

SYNOPSIS

       cdtoa  [-n] [-s] [-z] [-e] [-E] infilename
	      [-h cixingfile ]	[ usagefreqfile ]

DEFAULT PATH

       /usr/local/bin/cWnn4/cdtoa

DESCRIPTION

       To convert the binary format of the dictionary to text
       format, and output to standard output(stdout).

       infilename is the name of the input binary format
       dictionary.

       The output may be piped into a file by using the ">"
       command.  For example,
	       cdtoa  dict.dic	>  dict.u
       "dict.u" here is the output text format dictionary, while the "dict.dic" is the input binary format dictionary.

       usagefreqfile  may  indicate  more  than one user usage frequency files (for a particular user).  These usage frequency information will be
       reflected in the text format dictionary created.

OPTIONS

       -s     To order the entries in text dictionary according to Pinyin or Zhuyin.

       -n     To attach sequence numbers to the output.

       -z     To convert the binary format back to text format in Zhuyin.
	      (Note: default is Pinyin)

       -e     If the Hanzi inside the text dictionary contains characters such as space and  tab,  they  will  be  compacted  to  special  format.
	      (Default)

       -E     If the Hanzi inside the text dictionary contains characters such as space and tab, they will NOT be compacted to special format.

       -h     cixingfile
	      To specify the Cixing definition file.

NOTE

       1.     The parts in [ ] are options.  They may be omitted.

       2.     The Pinyin and Zhuyin dictionary has the same format.

       3.     The default conversion result of the text dictionary is in Pinyin.

								    13 May 1992 							  CDTOA(1)
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