[Haskell-cafe] two problems with Data.Binary and Data.ByteString

[Don Stewart]

newsham:
> >Should the file be closed when the last byte is read (in this
> >case its definitely reading all four bytes) or when the first
> >byte after that is read (in this case it probably doesn't
> >attempt to read more than 4 bytes)?
> 
> I'll answer my own question.  Both Prelude.readFile and
> Data.ByteString.Lazy.Char8.readFile will keep the file open
> after reading the last byte and close it when trying to
> read further.  Proof:
> 
>   module Main where
>   import Control.Applicative
>   -- import qualified Data.ByteString.Lazy.Char8 as B
>   import Prelude as B
> 
>   stateFile = "1word32.bin"
>   main = do
>       x <- B.take 4 <$> B.readFile stateFile
>       -- x <- B.take 5 <$> B.readFile stateFile
>       print x
>       B.writeFile stateFile x
> 
> This works for Prelude and ByteString when taking 5 (there are
> exactly 4 bytes in "1word32.bin") and fail when taking 4.
> 
> I'm not sure that this behavior is so bad..  there might be some
> advantages...  but it might be nice to have it close after the last
> byte is read...
> 
> However, I think probably the real blame here should probably go
> to Data.Binary which doesn't attempt to check that it has consumed
> all of its input after doing a "decode".  If "decode" completes
> and there is unconsumed data, it should probably raise an error
> (it already raises errors for premature EOF).  There's no reason
> for it not to, since it does not provide the unconsumed data to
> the caller when its done, anyway...
> 

This is perhaps a use case for Data.Binary.Strict then.

-- Don