OpenEuphoria

Re: binary files ,kudos,RE:new to this

• Posted by Derek Parnell <ddparnell at bigpond.com> Jan 31, 2003
• 386 views

On Thu, 30 Jan 2003 23:01:30 +0000, Pete Lomax <petelomax at blueyonder.co.uk> 
wrote:

>
> On Tue, 28 Jan 2003 15:05:36 -0300, rforno at tutopia.com wrote:
>
>> A byte has 8 bits and so 256 different characters can be coded into it. 
>> When
>> these characters are in the range of the letters, numbers and special
>> characters, plus 'carriage return', 'tab' and 'new line', the file is 
>> said
>> to be of type 'text'. If other characters are allowed, the file is said 
>> to
>> be 'binary'.
>
> Quite true. Also, however the term binary is often used specifically
> to mean executable files (as opposed to source code). Particularly if
> you see the phrase "Windows binary" it invariably refers to a program
> file, not say word (.doc), excel (.xls), bitmap (.bmp) etc files which
> are binary files that occur on windows. No biggie, just pointing out a
> popular (mis)use of the term I felt you (jdube) should be aware of.
>

You're right, Pete. This is a useful bit of info.

This usage evolved from the idea of compiling source code (text files) in 
to executable code (binary files). The term 'binaries' has come to mean any 
executable file, whether it be a true binary data file or a text file (as 
in scripts). For example, a lot of unix scripts, which are text files, are 
stored together with compiled code in a '/bin' directory.

-- 

cheers,
Derek Parnell