base64url

base64url

base64url encodes and decodes Base64URL data, as specified in RFC 4648. With no options, base64url reads raw data from stdin and writes encoded data as a continuous block to stdout.

Note: To decode hard wrapped encoded data, line breaks are removed before decoding.

Usage

base64url -i fileA.txt -o fileB.txt encodes the content of file fileA.txt into a file fileB.txt

Usage: base64url [options]

Options:
--decode, -d        decodes input
--input, -i         input file ("-" for stdin, default -)
--output, -o        output file ("-" for stdout, default -)
--break, -b         Insert line breaks every count characters.  Default is 0, which generates an
                    unbroken stream
--version, -v       display version
--help, -h          display help

Version:
    base64url 1.0-src
Read more:
    github.com/theovassiliou/base64url

Examples

base64url -i testdocs/text/Text.txt -o testdocs/text/encodedText.txt base64url encodes the file testdocs/text/Text.txt into file testdocs/text/encodedText.txt. This would be equivalent to base64url -i testdocs/text/Text.txt > testdocs/text/encodedText.txt

base64url -d -i testdocs/text/encodedText.txt -o testdocs/text/decodedText.txt base64url decode the file testdocs/text/encodedText.txt in file testdocs/text/decodedText.txt

The same could be achieved with cat testdocs/text/encodedText.txt | base64url -d > testdocs/text/decodedText.txt

To verify that original text and decoded text are exactly the same we could use

diff testdocs/text/decodedText.txt testdocs/text/Text.txt

Another proof that the encoding is reversible can be generated with

$ echo "This is a Test" | base64url | base64url -d
This is Test

This takes the string "This is a Test" as input via stdin and pipes the resulting encoded string as input to the decoding.

Using the -b count parameter a line break every count character is added. base64url respects this possibility and removes line breaks prior to decoding a string

$ echo "This is a Test" | base64url -b 5
VGhpc
yBpcy
BhIFR
lc3QK
$ echo "This is a Test" | base64url -b 5 | base64url -d
This is a Test

The directory testdocs/binary contains a binary file RandomNumbers.dat you can play around with.