base64.b64encode(data)
Marcin Rak
mrak at sightlineinnovation.com
Sun Jun 12 14:56:18 EDT 2016
Hi to everyone.
Let's say I have some binary data, be it whatever, in the 'data' variable. After calling the following line
b64_encoded_data = base64.b64encode(data)
my b64_encoded_data variables holds, would you believe it, a string as bytes!.
That is, the b64_encoded_data variable is of type 'bytes' and when you peek inside it's a string (made up of what seems to be only characters that exist in Base 64). Why isn't it a string yet? In fact, I now on that variable have to apply the decode('utf-8') method to get a string object holding the exact same sequence of characters as was held by b64_encoded_data bytes variable.
I'm a little confused as to why I would even have to apply the
.decode('utf-8') method - why doesn't base64.b64encode provide us with a result that is a 'str'?
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