But looking at the output is confusing.

I guess you never worked with data files (whether text or binary) on a VAX or other DEC OS. Maybe this format was commonly used on other systems of the same era besides DEC, but that's where I learned it, and the first time I had to use a non-DEC OS, where I didn't have this sort of hex-dump output format (or I just couldn't find a tool to do it), I wrote my own (in C) -- which I'm still using almost daily, 20 years later.

It's a remarkably useful display technique, whether you're doing a quick visual diagnosis of an unfamiliar data file, or a fine-grained, detailed inspection of output from a program you're writing (or reverse-engineering).

I tend to prefer having the central hex columns be bytes by default, rather than quads (though an option to change the size of the hex "word" is vital, as well as switching to decimals or even floats on occasion). But just having that together with the ASCII content right along side it is so handy in so many ways...

In reply to Re: What is this question asking? by graff
in thread What is this question asking? by Herkum

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