Need to know if a file as only ASCII charaters

MRAB python at mrabarnett.plus.com
Tue Jun 16 14:35:49 EDT 2009


norseman wrote:
> Scott David Daniels wrote:
>> Dave Angel wrote:
>>> Jorge wrote:
>>>> Hi there,
>>>> I'm making  a application that reads 3 party generated ASCII files, 
>>>> but some
>>>> times
>>>> the files are corrupted totally or partiality and I need to know if 
>>>> it's a
>>>> ASCII file with *nix line terminators.
>>>> In linux I can run the file command but the applications should run in
>>>> windows.
> 
> you are looking for a \x0D (the Carriage Return) \x0A (the Line feed) 
> combination. If present you have Microsoft compatibility. If not you 
> don't.  If you think High Bits might be part of the corruption, filter 
> each byte with byte && \x7F  (byte AND'ed with hex 7F or 127 base 10) 
> then check for the \x0D \x0A combination.
> Run the test on a known text setup. Intel uses one order and the SUN and 
> the internet another.  The BIG/Little ending confuses many. Intel 
> reverses the order of multibyte numerics.  Thus - Small machine has big 
> ego or largest byte value last. Big Ending.  Big machine has small ego. 
> Little Ending.  Some coders get the 0D0A backwards, some don't.  You 
> might want to test both.
> 
In an ASCII file endianness is irrelevant.




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