Programming Tutorials

Vb.net binary reader and writer

By: Issac in VB.net Tutorials on 2009-01-31  

BinaryReader is used to read primitive types as binary values in a specific encoding stream. This object works at lower level of streams, it also works stream objects that provide access to the underlying bytes. You have to create FileStream Object to create BinaryReader object and then pass it to the constructor method.

Dim readStream As FileStream
  readStream = New FileStream("c:\testBinary.dat", FileMode.Open)
  Dim readBinary As New BinaryReader (readStream) 

The main advantages of Binary information are that stores files as Binary format is the best practice of space utilization.

Imports System.IO
Public Class Form1
Private Sub Button1_Click(ByVal sender As System.Object, _
ByVal e As System.EventArgs) Handles Button1.Click
        Dim readStream As FileStream
        Dim msg As String
        Try
readStream = New FileStream("c:\testBinary.dat", FileMode.Open)
            Dim readBinary As New BinaryReader(readStream)
            msg = readBinary.ReadString()
            MsgBox(msg)
            readStream.Close()
        Catch ex As Exception
            MsgBox(ex.ToString)
        End Try
    End Sub
End Class

BinaryWriter you can use in the same way to write as Binary Reader.

BinaryWriter is used to read primitive types as binary values in a specific encoding stream. This object works at lower level of streams, it also works stream objects that provide access to the underlying bytes. You have to create FileStream Object to create BinaryWriter object and then pass it to the constructor method.

Dim writeStream As FileStream
writeStream = New FileStream("c:\testBinary.dat", FileMode.Create)
Dim writeBinay As New BinaryWriter (writeStream) 

The main advantages of Binary information are that it is not easily human readable and stores files as Binary format is the best practice of space utilization.

Imports System.IO
Public Class Form1
Private Sub Button1_Click(ByVal sender As System.Object, _
ByVal e As System.EventArgs) Handles Button1.Click
        Dim writeStream As FileStream
        Try
writeStream = New FileStream("c:\testBinary.dat", FileMode.Create)
            Dim writeBinay As New BinaryWriter(writeStream)
            writeBinay.Write ("This is a test for BinaryWriter!")
            writeBinay.Close()
        Catch ex As Exception
            MsgBox(ex.ToString)
        End Try
    End Sub
End Class 

BinaryReader you can use in the same way to read as binary.