How to print numbers read from a binary file in lua?

Question

I have a binary file and I want to read its contents with lua. I know that it contains float numbers represented as 4 bytes with no delimeters between them. So I open the file and do t=file:read(4). Now I want to print the non-binary representation of the number, but if I do print(t), I only get sth like x98xC1x86. What should I do?

lhf · Accepted Answer · 2017-04-20 21:21:50Z

3

If you're running Lua 5.3, try this code:

t=file:read(4)
t=string.unpack(t,"f")
print(t)

The library function string.unpack converts binary data to Lua types.

answered Apr 20, 2017 at 21:21

lhf

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3 Comments

Controller Over a year ago

I am using this in torch, which comes with lua 5.2. So, is there any alternative?

David Crayford Over a year ago

You can use Robertos struct library to get the same functionality in older versions of Lua.

lhf Over a year ago

Also my own lpack.

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