Encode_Decode

developer tips for cli commands

Base64

You can easily encode and decode Base64 on the Linux command line using the base64 utility. Here are the steps to do both:

Base64 Encoding

To encode a file or a string in Base64, you can use the following commands:

Encoding a File

To encode a file named file.txt:

base64 file.txt > file.txt.b64

This command will read file.txt, encode its contents in Base64, and save the output to file.txt.b64.

Encoding a String

To encode a string directly:

echo -n "Your string here" | base64

The -n option for echo ensures that no newline character is added at the end of the string.

Base64 Decoding

To decode a Base64-encoded file or string, you can use the following commands:

Decoding a File

To decode a file named file.txt.b64:

base64 -d file.txt.b64 > file.txt

This command will read file.txt.b64, decode its contents from Base64, and save the output to file.txt.

Decoding a String

To decode a Base64 string directly:

echo "WW91ciBzdHJpbmcgaGVyZQ==" | base64 -d

This will decode the Base64-encoded string and print the result.

Examples

Encoding a File

base64 myfile.txt > myfile.txt.b64

Encoding a String

echo -n "Hello, World!" | base64

Output:

SGVsbG8sIFdvcmxkIQ==

Decoding a File

base64 -d myfile.txt.b64 > myfile_decoded.txt

Decoding a String

echo "SGVsbG8sIFdvcmxkIQ==" | base64 -d

Output:

Hello, World!

You can effectively encode and decode data in Base64 on the Linux command line using these commands.