Write Byte array to file

Question

I'm trying to write a byte array to txt file and the result is gibberish instead of my bytes.

This is my function:

public bool ByteArrayToFile(string _FileName, byte[] _ByteArray)
{
   try
   {
      // Open file for reading
      System.IO.FileStream _FileStream = 
         new System.IO.FileStream(_FileName, System.IO.FileMode.Create,
                                  System.IO.FileAccess.Write);
      // Writes a block of bytes to this stream using data from
      // a byte array.
      _FileStream.Write(_ByteArray, 0, _ByteArray.Length);

      // close file stream
      _FileStream.Close();

      return true;
   }
   catch (Exception _Exception)
   {
      // Error
      Console.WriteLine("Exception caught in process: {0}",
                        _Exception.ToString());
   }

   // error occured, return false
   return false;
}

And the result:

"3DUf " E  _Xu  €ˆ‏
=2‡¬1p% n Kפ C

Also, your naming convention is strange, locals should be camelCase, no underscores. And returning a bool to indicate success/failure is also frowned upon in .Net. Exceptions are supposed to be the method used to indicate failure. I would just remove that try/catch - let any error bubble up until you can actually meaningfully handle it, even if that's just a top-level handler that logs it and quits. — Blorgbeard
– Blorgbeard, Commented Mar 7, 2014 at 10:39
your code is correct for its purpose, show us _ByteArray variable content. — hmnzr
– hmnzr, Commented Mar 7, 2014 at 10:40
This content is packet byte[] from PcapDotNet project (packet.buffer return byte[]) — user1860934
– user1860934, Commented Mar 7, 2014 at 10:44

Henk Holterman · Accepted Answer · 2014-03-07 10:48:28Z

8

Your writing code looks OK but the much simpler solution:

public bool ByteArrayToFile(string fileName, byte[] byteArray)
{
   System.IO.File.WriteAllBytes(fileName, byteArray);
   return true;
}

I try to write byte array to txt file

In that case the byte-array should be the correct representation of a text, in some encoding.

I suspect you have some encoding issues in the steps that produce byteArray.

edited Mar 7, 2014 at 10:48

answered Mar 7, 2014 at 10:41

Henk Holterman

276k33 gold badges353 silver badges540 bronze badges

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

1 Comment

user1860934 Over a year ago

This content is packet byte[] from PcapDotNet project (packet.buffer return byte[])

ili · Accepted Answer · 2014-03-07 10:44:39Z

0

It is better to use using for file stream, or call Close() in finally block
There is no "text files". Text is just set of bytes, bytes are represented as signs with encoding (ASCII, Unicode, UTF8, etc.). When you are writing bytes system writes them as is, and when you are looking the file with notepad it shows it with encoding (it reads 0x31 and shows 1, and so on).
If you are trying to write text file, look forward for File.WriteAllText() method

answered Mar 7, 2014 at 10:44

ili

7621 gold badge4 silver badges16 bronze badges

Collectives™ on Stack Overflow

Write Byte array to file

2 Answers 2

1 Comment

Comments

Your Answer

Linked

Hot Network Questions

Collectives™ on Stack Overflow

2 Answers 2

1 Comment

Comments

Your Answer

Sign up or log in

Post as a guest

Linked

Related