Description.

Base16 Encoding Utility is a small but useful console application for MS Windows operating system that allows you to convert your data using Base16 encoding and provides additional tools to manage the formatting of the hex dump output. Application input can be obtained from files, command line, keyboard or by redirecting output from another console application.
The Base16 algorithm provides encoding in such a way that each byte of data is split into two 4-bit values and represented by two hexadecimal digits.
Also, this utility can restore the original data from text containing a hex dump.

System requirements.

Microsoft Windows XP (or later) operating system with Microsoft .NET Framework 4.0 installed.

Contents.

Base16_Install.zip contains the installer that copies the base16.exe file to the Program Files folder and adds the installed path to %PATH% environment variable. You must restart your computer after installation for the changes to take effect.
Base16_Standalone.zip contains only base16.exe executable file and readme.txt document.
Base16_Source.zip contains base16.cs source code file for you to download and modify as you see fit.

Features.

✔️ Encode data.
✔️ Decode hex dumps.
✔️ Read files, text input or redirected output from console apps.
✔️ Write result to file or console window.
✔️ Convert data to array declarations for common languages.

Screenshots.

Usage.

This utility must be called from the command line with the specified arguments:

base16 [-e|-d] [-s] [-delimiter char] [-prefix prestr] [-postfix poststr] [-header hstr] [-footer fstr] [-l] [-w width] [-sfx] [-c] [-o outfile] [-f] file1 [file2...] [-t text] [-i]

Program operation mode.

Parameters that are used only for encoding.

Configuring input and output.

Examples of using.

base16 file1.txt

Will display encoded data of file "file1.txt".

base16 file1.txt > file2.txt
or
base16 file1.txt -o file2.txt

Will save encoded data from "file1.txt" to "file2.txt".

base16 -s file1.txt -o file2.txt

Will save encoded data from file "file1.txt" to output "file2.txt", separated by bytes.

echo Foo | base16 -s

Will display: 46 6F 6F 20 0D 0A.

echo Bar | base16 -s -prefix 0x -postfix ,

Will display: 0x42, 0x61, 0x72, 0x20, 0x0D, 0x0A.

base16 -t Hello, world!

Will display: 48656C6C6F2C20776F726C6421.

base16 -i
Will input data from the keyboard and encode it.

echo 42 61 72 | base16 -d
or
base16 -d -t 42 61 72

Will display: Bar.

base16 -s -w 16 -l -delimiter ; test.txt

Will display the encoded content of the file "test.txt" with a custom separator ";" between bytes.

type encoded.txt | base16 -d > original.txt
or
base16 -d encoded.txt -o original.txt

Will output the decoded content of the file "encoded.txt" to a new file "original.txt".

base16 -c -t Hello, world

Will display array declare:

unsigned char[]
{  
0x48, 0x65, 0x6C, 0x6C, 0x6F, 0x2C, 0x77, 0x6F, 0x72, 0x6C, 0x64  
}  

If you type "base16 -c -t Hello, world | clip", this ad will be stored to the clipboard immediately.

base16 -sfx -o hello.bat -t Hello, world

Will store encoded text into self-extracting batch file "hello.bat".
The content of batch file "hello.bat" looks like this:

  :BEGIN  
  @ECHO OFF  
  SET /P filename="Enter filename: "  
  SET tmpfile=%~d0%~p0%RANDOM%.tmp  
  SET outfile=%~d0%~p0%filename%  
  ECHO tmpfile = %tmpfile%  
  ECHO outfile = %outfile%  
  FINDSTR "^[0-9A-F][0-9A-F][^\s]" %0 > "%tmpfile%"  
  certutil -decodehex "%tmpfile%" "%outfile%"  
  TIMEOUT 3  
  DEL /F /Q "%tmpfile%" %0  
  EXIT  

48 65 6C 6C 6F 2C 20 77 6F 72 6C 64

If you run "hello.bat", this script will ask for a filename and write "Hello, world" to it.