How to: Write a Binary File (C++/CLI)

The following code example demonstrates writing binary data to a file. Two classes from the System.IO namespace are used: FileStream and BinaryWriter. FileStream represents the actual file, while BinaryWriter provides an interface to the stream that allows binary access.

The following code example writes a file containing integers in binary format. This file can be read with the code in How to: Read a Binary File (C++/CLI).

Example

// binary_write.cpp
// compile with: /clr
#using<system.dll>
using namespace System;
using namespace System::IO;

int main()
{
   array<Int32>^ data = {1, 2, 3, 10000};

   FileStream^ fs = gcnew FileStream("data.bin", FileMode::Create);
   BinaryWriter^ w = gcnew BinaryWriter(fs);

   try 
   {
      Console::WriteLine("writing data to file:");
      for (int i=0; i<data->Length; i+)
      {
         Console::WriteLine(data[i]);
         w->Write(data[i]);
      }
   }
   catch (Exception^) 
   {
     Console::WriteLine("data could not be written");
     fs->Close();
     return -1;
   }

   fs->Close();
   return 0;
}

See Also

Other Resources

File and Stream I/O

.NET Programming Guide