raw-to-sexp {ravetools}

Convert raw vectors to R vectors

Description

Convert raw vectors to R vectors

Usage

raw_to_uint8(x)

raw_to_uint16(x)

raw_to_uint32(x)

raw_to_int8(x)

raw_to_int16(x)

raw_to_int32(x)

raw_to_int64(x)

raw_to_float(x)

raw_to_string(x)

Arguments

x

raw vector of bytes

Details

For numeric conversions, the function names are straightforward. For example, raw_to_uintN converts raw vectors to unsigned integers, and raw_to_intN converts raw vectors to signed integers. The number 'N' stands for the number of bits used to store the integer. For example raw_to_uint8 uses 8 bits (1 byte) to store an integer, hence the value range is 0-255.

The input data length must be multiple of the element size represented by the underlying data. For example uint16 integer uses 16 bites, and one raw number uses 8 bits, hence two raw vectors can form one unsigned integer-16. That is, raw_to_uint16 requires the length of input to be multiple of two. An easy calculation is: the length of x times 8, must be divided by 'N' (see last paragraph for definition).

The returned data uses the closest available R native data type that can fully represent the data. For example, R does not have single float type, hence raw_to_float returns double type, which can represent all possible values in float. For raw_to_uint32, the potential value range is 0 - (2^32-1). This exceeds the limit of R integer type (-2^31) - (2^31-1). Therefore, the returned values will be real (double float) data type.

There is no native data type that can store integer-64 data in R, package bit64 provides integer64 type, which will be used by raw_to_int64. Currently there is no solution to convert raw to unsigned integer-64 type.

raw_to_string converts raw to character string. This function respects null character, hence is slightly different than the native rawToChar, which translates raw byte-by-byte. If each raw byte represents a valid character, then the above two functions returns the same result. However, when the characters represented by raw bytes are invalid, raw_to_string will stop parsing and returns only the valid characters, while rawToChar will still try to parse, and most likely to result in errors. Please see Examples for comparisons.

Value

Numeric vectors, except for raw_to_string, which returns a string.

Examples

# 0x00, 0x7f, 0x80, 0xFF
x <- as.raw(c(0, 127, 128, 255))

raw_to_uint8(x)

# The first bit becomes the integer sign
# 128 -> -128, 255 -> -1
raw_to_int8(x)

## Comments based on little endian system

# 0x7f00 (32512), 0xFF80 (65408 unsigned, or -128 signed)
raw_to_uint16(x)
raw_to_int16(x)

# 0xFF807F00 (4286611200 unsigned, -8356096 signed)
raw_to_uint32(x)
raw_to_int32(x)

# ---------------------------- String ---------------------------

# ASCII case: all valid
x <- charToRaw("This is an ASCII string")

raw_to_string(x)
rawToChar(x)

x <- c(charToRaw("This is the end."),
       as.raw(0),
       charToRaw("*** is invalid"))

# rawToChar will raise error
raw_to_string(x)

# ---------------------------- Integer64 ------------------------
# Runs on little endian system
x <- as.raw(c(0x80, 0x00, 0x7f, 0x80, 0xFF, 0x50, 0x7f, 0x00))

# Calculate bitstring, which concaternates the followings
# 10000000 (0x80), 00000000 (0x00), 01111111 (0x7f), 10000000 (0x80),
# 11111111 (0xFF), 01010000 (0x50), 01111111 (0x7f), 00000000 (0x00)

if(.Platform$endian == "little") {
  bitstring <- paste0(
    "00000000011111110101000011111111",
    "10000000011111110000000010000000"
  )
} else {
  bitstring <- paste0(
    "00000001000000001111111000000001",
    "11111111000010101111111000000000"
  )
}

# This is expected value
bit64::as.integer64(structure(
  bitstring,
  class = "bitstring"
))

# This is actual value
raw_to_int64(x)