bitstring 1.3.0

Simple construction, analysis and modification of binary data.

bitstring is a pure Python module designed to help make the creation and analysis of binary data as simple and natural as possible.

BitStrings can be constructed from integers (big and little endian), hex, octal, binary, strings or files. They can be sliced, joined, reversed, inserted into, overwritten, etc. with simple functions or slice notation. They can also be read from, searched and replaced, and navigated in, similar to a file or stream.

bitstring is open source software, and has been released under the MIT licence.

This version supports Python 2.6 and 3.x. For Python 2.4 and 2.5 you should instead download version 1.0.

Installation

If you have downloaded and unzipped the package then you need to run the setup.py script with the ‘install’ argument:

python setup.py install

This should put bitstring.py in your site-packages directory. You may need to run this with root privileges on Unix-like systems.

Alternatively just copy the bitstring.py file to where you want it!

If you haven’t downloaded the package then you can just try:

easy_install bitstring

If you’re using Windows then there is an installer available from the downloads tab on the project’s homepage.

Documentation

The manual for the bitstring module is available as HTML and as a PDF. It contains a walk-through of all the features and a complete reference section. It is part of the source package and it can also be viewed on the project’s homepage.

Simple Examples

Creation:

>>> a = BitString(bin='00101')
>>> b = BitString(a_file_object)
>>> c = BitString('0xff, 0b101, 0o65, uint:6=22')
>>> d = pack('intle:16, hex=a, 0b1', 100, a='0x34f')
>>> e = pack('<16h', *range(16))

Different interpretations, slicing and concatenation:

>>> a = BitString('0x1af')
>>> a.hex, a.bin, a.uint
('0x1af', '0b000110101111', 431)
>>> a[10:3:-1].bin
'0b1110101'
>>> 3*a + '0b100'
BitString('0o0657056705674')

Reading data sequentially:

>>> b = BitString('0x160120f')
>>> b.readbits(12).hex
'0x160'
>>> b.pos = 0
>>> b.read('uint:12')
352
>>> b.readlist('uint:12, bin:3')
[288, '0b111']

Searching, inserting and deleting:

>>> c = BitString('0b00010010010010001111')   # c.hex == '0x1248f'
>>> c.find('0x48')
True
>>> c.replace('0b001', '0xabc')
>>> c.insert('0b0000')
>>> del c[12:16]

Unit Tests

To run the unit tests:

python test_bitstring.py

The unit tests should all pass for Python 2.6, 3.0 and 3.1.

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The bitstring module has been released as open source under the MIT License. Copyright (c) 2010 Scott Griffiths

For more information see the project’s homepage on Google Code: <http://python-bitstring.googlecode.com>