12.14 binhex -- Encode and decode binhex4 files
Description: binhex -- Encode and decode binhex4 files
Keywords: lib

# 12.14 `binhex` -- Encode and decode binhex4 files

This module encodes and decodes files in binhex4 format, a format allowing representation of Macintosh files in ASCII. On the Macintosh, both forks of a file and the finder information are encoded (or decoded), on other platforms only the data fork is handled.

The `binhex` module defines the following functions:

`binhex`( | input, output)

  Convert a binary file with filename input to binhex file output. The output parameter can either be a filename or a file-like object (any object supporting a `write()` and `close()` method).

`hexbin`( | input[, output])

  Decode a binhex file input. input may be a filename or a file-like object supporting `read()` and `close()` methods. The resulting file is written to a file named output, unless the argument is omitted in which case the output filename is read from the binhex file.

The following exception is also defined:

exception `Error`
  Exception raised when something can't be encoded using the binhex format (for example, a filename is too long to fit in the filename field), or when input is not properly encoded binhex data.

See Also:

Module `binascii`:
  Support module containing ASCII-to-binary and binary-to-ASCII conversions.