bytestring-0.10.12.0: Fast, compact, strict and lazy byte strings with a list interface
An efficient compact, immutable byte string type (both strict and lazy) suitable for binary or 8-bit character data.
The
ByteString
type represents sequences of bytes or 8-bit characters.
It is suitable for high performance use, both in terms of large data
quantities, or high speed requirements. The
ByteString
functions follow
the same style as Haskell's ordinary lists, so it is easy to convert code
from using
String
to
ByteString
.
Two
ByteString
variants are provided:
-
Strict
ByteStrings keep the string as a single large array. This makes them convenient for passing data between C and Haskell. -
Lazy
ByteStrings use a lazy list of strict chunks which makes it suitable for I/O streaming tasks.
The
Char8
modules provide a character-based view of the same
underlying
ByteString
types. This makes it convenient to handle mixed
binary and 8-bit character content (which is common in many file formats
and network protocols).
The
Builder
module provides an efficient way to build up
ByteString
s
in an ad-hoc way by repeated concatenation. This is ideal for fast
serialisation or pretty printing.
There is also a
ShortByteString
type which has a lower memory overhead
and can can be converted to or from a
ByteString
, but supports very few
other operations. It is suitable for keeping many short strings in memory.
ByteString
s are not designed for Unicode. For Unicode strings you should
use the
Text
type from the
text
package.
These modules are intended to be imported qualified, to avoid name clashes with Prelude functions, e.g.
import qualified Data.ByteString as BS
Modules