Convert a String to binary sequence in C# with zero padding when not 8 bits of char

Question

I use this method which I saw in one of the questions to convert ascii to binary string:

public string GetBits(string input)
{
    StringBuilder sb = new StringBuilder();
    foreach (byte b in ASCIIEncoding.UTF8.GetBytes(input))
    {
        sb.Append(Convert.ToString(b, 2));
    }
    return sb.ToString();
}

But, If the input is something like the message bellow which contains chars like 'space' or others:

"Hello, How are you?"

The above method is building a sequence of 6 or 7 bit. When I try to decode the long sequence(which I know every 8 bit is a character) I get a big problem that part of the message chars are 6 or 7 or 8 bit and everything is mixed up. How can I improve it? Thanks

fubo · Accepted Answer · 2015-06-03 09:55:27Z

2

how about

public string GetBits(string input)
{
    return string.Concat(input.Select(x => Convert.ToString(x, 2).PadLeft(8, '0')));
}

answered Jun 3, 2015 at 9:55

fubo

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3 Comments

CodeCaster Over a year ago

Won't this return 000000x0 for input 0?

fubo Over a year ago

@CodeCaster - a "0"-String leads to "00110000"

CodeCaster Over a year ago

I don't mean a "0" string, but a string consisting of a single 0 char. Edit: nevermind, I looked at the wrong docs and though this printed 0x(bits), but the 0x part didn't come from Convert.ToString().

cramopy · Accepted Answer · 2015-06-03 10:07:28Z

1

You problem is leading zeros. If you want to return 8 bits for every character, then you have to add leading zeros. I used PadLeft in your case.

public string GetBits(string input)
{
    StringBuilder sb = new StringBuilder();
    foreach (byte b in ASCIIEncoding.UTF8.GetBytes(input))
    {
        sb.Append(Convert.ToString(b, 2).PadLeft(8, '0'));
    }
    return sb.ToString();
}

edited Jun 3, 2015 at 10:07

cramopy

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answered Jun 3, 2015 at 10:05

Dejan Dular

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