Base64

Base64 is a freeware way of encoding 8-bit characters using only ASCII printable characters similar to UUENCODE. UUENCODE embeds a filename where BASE64 does not. You will see BASE64 used in encoding digital certificates, in encoding user:password string in an Authorization: header for HTTP. The spec is described in RFC 2045. Don t confuse Base64 with x-www-form-urlencoded which is handled by java.net.URLEncoder.encode/decode or Base64u. Base64 armouring uses only the characters A-Z a-z 0-9 +/=. This makes it suitable for encoding binary data as SQL strings, that will work no matter what the encoding. Unfortunately + / and = all have special meaning in URLs. Base64u gets around this problem. It is a variant on Base64 that uses - and in preference to + / and =, so that it can be used in URLEncoded contexts with or without URLEncoding. Use base64 like this: // Base64 armouring import com.mindprod.base64.Base64, ... // sample byte array to encode byte toSend = { byte 0xfc, byte 0x0f, byte 0xc0}, // create encoder object Base64 base64 = new Base64 , base64.setLineLength 72 , // default // encoding a byte String send = base64.encoder toSend , // decoding a byte byte reconstituted = base64.decoder sent , use Base64u the same way: // Base64u armouring import com.mindprod.base64.Base64u, ... // sample byte array to encode byte toSend = { byte 0xfc, byte 0x0f, byte 0xc0}, // create encoder object Base64u base64u = new Base64u , base64u.setLineLength 72 , // default // encoding a byte String send = base64u.encoder toSend , // decoding a byte byte reconstituted = base64u.decoder sent , For an example that starts and ends with a String, see Example.java to run: java.exe com.mindprod.base64.Example
Base64
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