is it possible to convert a string to varbinary in PHP without using the SQL function

Question

I was wondering if it is possible to convert a string to varbinary with PHP to get the same effect as with using the SQL function CONVERT(varbinary, 'data') I would like to do this because I am using codeigniter and would like to use active records for this query, and because of this not directly use a string of SQL, but I need to insert the data into a varbinary field in MS-SQL.

Thanks :)

dqhendricks · Accepted Answer · 2011-01-09T02:24:56.397

6

you can cast a string as a binary if you are using a recent enough version of PHP.

$binary = (binary)$string;

(binary) casting and b prefix forward support was added in PHP 5.2.1

http://www.php.net/manual/en/language.types.type-juggling.php

edited Jan 09 '11 at 02:24

answered Jan 09 '11 at 01:59

dqhendricks

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score 3 · Answer 2 · answered Jan 13 '11 at 16:08

3

public static function str2bin($str) { 
  return '0x'.strtoupper(bin2hex($str));
}

answered Jan 13 '11 at 16:08

Till

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Thanks Till, this helped me immensely when converting the other way. `$data = hex2bin(substr($data, 2));` – Brett Jan 23 '18 at 04:11
This is exactly what I was looking for, but it returns me a binary value as a string. Is there any way around this as I need a raw binary value to insert into a database, not varchar. – Riples Nov 10 '20 at 00:01

score 0 · Answer 3 · answered Mar 25 '13 at 17:57

You can also use the pack function

example convert {326546, 4356345, 43646346, 366357547} to var-binary as Unsigned int

$_BIN=pack('I*', 326546, 4356345, 43646346, 366357547);

you can find more examples at http://www.php.net/manual/en/function.pack.php

is it possible to convert a string to varbinary in PHP without using the SQL function

3 Answers3

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