On Thu, May 30, 2002 at 09:08:14PM -0500, Michael Barton wrote: > filter in their API. Files just contain bytes, there's nothing magic about > the fact it contains text other than that there are competing standards for > text file formatting.
Hold on, you are forgetting something. Files are not plain stream of bytes. Files contain specific data. And depending on the data you have to do translations when transfering it from one platform to another. If you have a file which contains numbers, one per line and seperated by line seperators (note: just specified a file format), and you transfer it to another machine, you have to make sure it still contains data as "numbers, one per line and seperated by line seperators". If you transfer it in the binary format, for example from a windows to a unix system, you might end up with a file containing a number, a CR and a line seperator. If you transfer it binary from an ASCII to an EBCDIC system, you will end up with a file containing complete rubbish. These are not what the formats are you expected to get it. If you transfer in the format "numbers,one per line followed by a newlline" (assuming both sender and receiver understand how this format looks like), then you will end up with a file in the format numbers, one per line and seperated with line seperators no matter what machine you are running it on. Euh... how did we get here? Anyway, files are not streams of bytes, files contain data in specific formats and these are *not* transferable over systems, unless they are in a format which both the sender and receiver understands and there is a way to translate between them. Edwin, going for a cup of tea. -- Edwin Groothuis | Personal website: http://www.MavEtJu.org [EMAIL PROTECTED] | Interested in MUDs? Visit Fatal Dimensions: bash$ :(){ :|:&};: | http://www.FatalDimensions.org/
