fastbencode

fastbencode is an implementation of the bencode serialization format originally used by BitTorrent.

The package includes both a pure-Python version and an optional C extension based on Cython. Both provide the same functionality, but the C extension provides significantly better performance.

Example:

>>> from fastbencode import bencode, bdecode
>>> bencode([1, 2, b'a', {b'd': 3}])
b'li1ei2e1:ad1:di3eee'
>>> bdecode(bencode([1, 2, b'a', {b'd': 3}]))
[1, 2, b'a', {b'd': 3}]

The default bencode/bdecode functions just operate on bytestrings. Use bencode_utf8 / bdecode_utf8 to serialize/deserialize all plain strings as UTF-8 bytestrings. Note that for performance reasons, all dictionary keys still have to be bytestrings.

License

fastbencode is available under the GNU GPL, version 2 or later.

Copyright

• Original Pure-Python bencoder (c) Petru Paler
• Cython version and modifications (c) Canonical Ltd
• Split out from Bazaar/Breezy by Jelmer Vernooij