Are you sure you want the binary?  You can use the bitwise |, ~, and &
operators to manipulate the bits of the byte.

On Tue, 23 Nov 2004 13:22:56 +0900, ruby talk <rubytalk / gmail.com> wrote:
> hmm... i really wanted the binary. is there a to_b?
> 
> 
> 
> 
> On Tue, 23 Nov 2004 13:11:50 +0900, Zach Dennis <zdennis / mktec.com> wrote:
> > ruby talk wrote:
> >
> >
> >
> > > a=File.open("c:\\1.txt")
> > > a.binmode
> > > print a.read(1)
> > >
> > > it prints the char. how can i get and play with the bits and bytes of the file?
> >
> > a=File.open("c:\\1.txt")
> > a.each_byte{ |byte|
> >         #play with each character/byte here
> > }
> >
> >
> > Zach
> >
> >
> 
>