UintNArray

Arbitrary bit-width typed array of unsigned integers.

Unsigned integer arrays of anything between 1 and 32 bit-width words, extending the standard JavaScript Uint8Array, Uint16Array, and Uint32Array.

Usage is equivalent to that of the standard Uint8Array, Uint16Array, and Uint32Array, except that the constructor takes an initial argument specifying the bit-width of the words in the array.

Usage

In browser:

import UintNArray from 'https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/npm/uintnarray-js@1.0.1/uintnarray.js';

In Node.js:

Install from npm and then

import UintNArray from 'uintnarray-js';

Example:

const ui8 = new Uint8Array([1, 2, 3, 4, 255, 254, 253, 252]);
const uiN = new UintNArray(4, ui8.buffer);
console.log(uiN.toString()); // "0,1,0,2,0,3,0,4,15,15,15,14,15,13,15,12"
ui8[1] = 99;
console.log(uiN.toString()); // "0,1,6,3,0,3,0,4,15,15,15,14,15,13,15,12"

Reference

Static properties, static methods, instance properties, and instance methods are as per the standard typed arrays Uint8Array, Uint16Array, and Uint32Array, with the following exceptions:

Constructor

UintNArray(bitWidth)
UintNArray(bitWidth, length)
UintNArray(bitWidth, typedArray)
UintNArray(bitWidth, object)
UintNArray(bitWidth, buffer [, bitOffset [, length]])

Equivalent to typed array constructors, except that the first argument is the bit width, which may be between 1 and 32.

When the second argument is a buffer, the third argument is a bit offset rather than a byte offset.

Static properties

UintNArray.BYTES_PER_ELEMENT is not available as bit-width is specified on construction.

Static methods

UintNArray.from() and UintNArray.of() are not available, as a UintNArray cannot be created without specifying bit-width.

Instance properties

Uint8Array.prototype.byteLength may return fractional values.

Uint8Array.prototype.byteOffset may return fractional values.

instanceof

Javascript typed arrays are not instances of Array, but UintNArray is.

new Uint8Array([ 1, 2, 3 ]) instanceof Array;    // false
new UintNArray(4, [ 1, 2, 3 ]) instanceof Array; // true

Endian-ness

Since it is working with arbitrary bit-widths, UintNArray is intrinsically big-endian.

Little-endian order is useful for flexibility in register storage: an (e.g.) int8* pointing to 00001001 will give the same value (9) as an int16* pointing to 00001001 00000000. Most modern computer architectures (32-bit and increasingly 64-bit) are little-endian.

With arbitrary bit-width words, the opposite applies: the value ‘9’ should be the same in (e.g.) a 15-bit, 16-bit, 0r 17-bit word:

15-bit: . .0000000 00001001
16-bit: . 00000000 00001001
17-bit: 0 00000000 00001001

Also, big-endian works as a byte stream: most network communications are big-endian – referred to as ‘network order’ (binary file formats such as PNG/GIF vary).

If required, little-endian ordering of units within the UintNArray can be obtained by using a DataView on the UintNArray.buffer.