Is there a printf converter to print in binary for

Question

I can print with printf as a hex or octal number. Is there a format tag to print as binary, or arbitrary base?

I am running gcc.

printf("%d %x %o\n", 10, 10, 10); //prints "10 A 12\n"
print("%b\n", 10); // prints "%b\n"

Answer 1

I liked the code by paniq, the static buffer is a good idea. However it fails if you want multiple binary formats in a single printf() because it always returns the same pointer and overwrites the array.

Here's a C style drop-in that rotates pointer on a split buffer.

char *
format_binary(unsigned int x)
{
    #define MAXLEN 8 // width of output format
    #define MAXCNT 4 // count per printf statement
    static char fmtbuf[(MAXLEN+1)*MAXCNT];
    static int count = 0;
    char *b;
    count = count % MAXCNT + 1;
    b = &fmtbuf[(MAXLEN+1)*count];
    b[MAXLEN] = '\0';
    for (int z = 0; z < MAXLEN; z++) { b[MAXLEN-1-z] = ((x>>z) & 0x1) ? '1' : '0'; }
    return b;
}

Answer 2

Based on @ideasman42's suggestion in his answer, this is a macro that provides int8,16,32 & 64 versions, reusing the INT8 macro to avoid repetition.

/* --- PRINTF_BYTE_TO_BINARY macro's --- */
#define PRINTF_BINARY_SEPARATOR
#define PRINTF_BINARY_PATTERN_INT8 "%c%c%c%c%c%c%c%c"
#define PRINTF_BYTE_TO_BINARY_INT8(i)    \
    (((i) & 0x80ll) ? '1' : '0'), \
    (((i) & 0x40ll) ? '1' : '0'), \
    (((i) & 0x20ll) ? '1' : '0'), \
    (((i) & 0x10ll) ? '1' : '0'), \
    (((i) & 0x08ll) ? '1' : '0'), \
    (((i) & 0x04ll) ? '1' : '0'), \
    (((i) & 0x02ll) ? '1' : '0'), \
    (((i) & 0x01ll) ? '1' : '0')

#define PRINTF_BINARY_PATTERN_INT16 \
    PRINTF_BINARY_PATTERN_INT8               PRINTF_BINARY_SEPARATOR              PRINTF_BINARY_PATTERN_INT8
#define PRINTF_BYTE_TO_BINARY_INT16(i) \
    PRINTF_BYTE_TO_BINARY_INT8((i) >> 8),   PRINTF_BYTE_TO_BINARY_INT8(i)
#define PRINTF_BINARY_PATTERN_INT32 \
    PRINTF_BINARY_PATTERN_INT16              PRINTF_BINARY_SEPARATOR              PRINTF_BINARY_PATTERN_INT16
#define PRINTF_BYTE_TO_BINARY_INT32(i) \
    PRINTF_BYTE_TO_BINARY_INT16((i) >> 16), PRINTF_BYTE_TO_BINARY_INT16(i)
#define PRINTF_BINARY_PATTERN_INT64    \
    PRINTF_BINARY_PATTERN_INT32              PRINTF_BINARY_SEPARATOR              PRINTF_BINARY_PATTERN_INT32
#define PRINTF_BYTE_TO_BINARY_INT64(i) \
    PRINTF_BYTE_TO_BINARY_INT32((i) >> 32), PRINTF_BYTE_TO_BINARY_INT32(i)
/* --- end macros --- */

#include <stdio.h>
int main() {
    long long int flag = 1648646756487983144ll;
    printf("My Flag "
           PRINTF_BINARY_PATTERN_INT64 "\n",
           PRINTF_BYTE_TO_BINARY_INT64(flag));
    return 0;
}

This outputs:

My Flag 0001011011100001001010110111110101111000100100001111000000101000

For readability you can change :#define PRINTF_BINARY_SEPARATOR to #define PRINTF_BINARY_SEPARATOR "," or #define PRINTF_BINARY_SEPARATOR " "

This will output:

My Flag 00010110,11100001,00101011,01111101,01111000,10010000,11110000,00101000

or

My Flag 00010110 11100001 00101011 01111101 01111000 10010000 11110000 00101000

Answer 3

Next will show to you memory layout:

#include <limits>
#include <iostream>
#include <string>

using namespace std;

template<class T> string binary_text(T dec, string byte_separator = " ") {
    char* pch = (char*)&dec;
    string res;
    for (int i = 0; i < sizeof(T); i++) {
        for (int j = 1; j < 8; j++) {
            res.append(pch[i] & 1 ? "1" : "0");
            pch[i] /= 2;
        }
        res.append(byte_separator);
    }
    return res;
}

int main() {
    cout << binary_text(5) << endl;
    cout << binary_text(.1) << endl;

    return 0;
}

Answer 4

This code should handle your needs up to 64 bits. I created 2 functions pBin & pBinFill. Both do the same thing, but pBinFill fills in the leading spaces with the fillChar. The test function generates some test data, then prints it out using the function.

char* pBinFill(long int x,char *so, char fillChar); // version with fill
char* pBin(long int x, char *so);                   // version without fill
#define kDisplayWidth 64

char* pBin(long int x,char *so)
{
 char s[kDisplayWidth+1];
 int  i=kDisplayWidth;
 s[i--]=0x00;   // terminate string
 do
 { // fill in array from right to left
  s[i--]=(x & 1) ? '1':'0';  // determine bit
  x>>=1;  // shift right 1 bit
 } while( x > 0);
 i++;   // point to last valid character
 sprintf(so,"%s",s+i); // stick it in the temp string string
 return so;
}

char* pBinFill(long int x,char *so, char fillChar)
{ // fill in array from right to left
 char s[kDisplayWidth+1];
 int  i=kDisplayWidth;
 s[i--]=0x00;   // terminate string
 do
 { // fill in array from right to left
  s[i--]=(x & 1) ? '1':'0';
  x>>=1;  // shift right 1 bit
 } while( x > 0);
 while(i>=0) s[i--]=fillChar;    // fill with fillChar 
 sprintf(so,"%s",s);
 return so;
}

void test()
{
 char so[kDisplayWidth+1]; // working buffer for pBin
 long int val=1;
 do
 {
   printf("%ld =\t\t%#lx =\t\t0b%s\n",val,val,pBinFill(val,so,'0'));
   val*=11; // generate test data
 } while (val < 100000000);
}

Output:
00000001 =  0x000001 =  0b00000000000000000000000000000001
00000011 =  0x00000b =  0b00000000000000000000000000001011
00000121 =  0x000079 =  0b00000000000000000000000001111001
00001331 =  0x000533 =  0b00000000000000000000010100110011
00014641 =  0x003931 =  0b00000000000000000011100100110001
00161051 =  0x02751b =  0b00000000000000100111010100011011
01771561 =  0x1b0829 =  0b00000000000110110000100000101001
19487171 = 0x12959c3 =  0b00000001001010010101100111000011

Answer 5

Is there a printf converter to print in binary format?

The printf() family is only able to print in base 8, 10, and 16 using the standard specifiers directly. I suggest creating a function that converts the number to a string per code's particular needs.

---

To print in any base [2-36]

All other answers so far have at least one of these limitations.

1. Use static memory for the return buffer. This limits the number of times the function may be used as an argument to printf().

2. Allocate memory requiring the calling code to free pointers.

3. Require the calling code to explicitly provide a suitable buffer.

4. Call printf() directly. This obliges a new function for to fprintf(), sprintf(), vsprintf(), etc.

5. Use a reduced integer range.

The following has none of the above limitation. It does require C99 or later and use of "%s". It uses a compound literal to provide the buffer space. It has no trouble with multiple calls in a printf().

#include <assert.h>
#include <limits.h>
#define TO_BASE_N (sizeof(unsigned)*CHAR_BIT + 1)

//                               v. compound literal .v
#define TO_BASE(x, b) my_to_base((char [TO_BASE_N]){""}, (x), (b))

// Tailor the details of the conversion function as needed
// This one does not display unneeded leading zeros
// Use return value, not `buf`
char *my_to_base(char *buf, unsigned i, int base) {
  assert(base >= 2 && base <= 36);
  char *s = &buf[TO_BASE_N - 1];
  *s = '\0';
  do {
    s--;
    *s = "0123456789ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ"[i % base];
    i /= base;
  } while (i);

  // Could employ memmove here to move the used buffer to the beginning

  return s;
}

#include <stdio.h>
int main(void) {
  int ip1 = 0x01020304;
  int ip2 = 0x05060708;
  printf("%s %s\n", TO_BASE(ip1, 16), TO_BASE(ip2, 16));
  printf("%s %s\n", TO_BASE(ip1, 2), TO_BASE(ip2, 2));
  puts(TO_BASE(ip1, 8));
  puts(TO_BASE(ip1, 36));
  return 0;
}

Output

1020304 5060708
1000000100000001100000100 101000001100000011100001000
100401404
A2F44

Answer 6

Here's how I did it for an unsigned int

void printb(unsigned int v) {
    unsigned int i, s = 1<<((sizeof(v)<<3)-1); // s = only most significant bit at 1
    for (i = s; i; i>>=1) printf("%d", v & i || 0 );
}