Re: reading network data

Ender <noreply@xxxxxxxxxxxx> writes:

I have an app that binds to a local socket to capture UDP data sent
from another machine.

The remote app is sending coordinate data. My
problem is that when I read the buffer of the data arriving, I can't
make it out. I'm even using wireshark to look at the data from the
remote host on the local port, and it doesn't look like number
data.

Of course it does! Even text is just numbers when it's in a packet.
OK, so I am being rather obvious here, but the point is serious. What
it does or does not look like to you is no help to anyone else.

Say a bit more:

(1) Do you know that you are looking in the right place or might that
be in question too? It helps a lot if you are sure of all the
encapsulating header formats -- including the inner-most one where the
data is actually being represented.

(2) What kind of number is being sent? You say coordinates, but of
what? It helps to know what the data is when trying to see how it is
being represented.

(3) Do you have small sample of the data with some idea of what
information it represents? You never know, someone here (not me!)
might recognise the format right way. Also, there may be more
suitable group to ask in, filled with people who know how your kind of
data is often encoded.

The data is not encrypted.

(4) How sure of that are you? One way to test is to take a chunk of
it and try to compress it with an general-purpose data compressor like
gzip. Of course, there is no need to do that if you can see
patterns.

--
Ben.
.