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    Base64 Decoding Explained

    Uploaded by

    mmhorii
    This document explains Rene Nyffenegger's base64 decoding algorithm. The algorithm works by taking the encoded 6-bit symbols, concatenating them into 8-bit bytes, and using bit shifting and masking to populate each byte. It populates the first byte using the first two digits of the first symbol and last two digits of the second symbol. The second byte uses the last four digits of the second symbol and first four non-prepended digits of the third symbol. The third byte uses the first two non-prepended digits of the third symbol and all six bits of the fourth symbol. Once the bytes are populated, it looks up the symbols for each byte in a table to produce the decoded string.

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    © All Rights Reserved
    Download as PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd

    Base64 Decoding Explained

    Uploaded by

    mmhorii
    189 views12 pages
    This document explains Rene Nyffenegger's base64 decoding algorithm. The algorithm works by taking the encoded 6-bit symbols, concatenating them into 8-bit bytes, and using bit shifting and masking to populate each byte. It populates the first byte using the first two digits of the first symbol and last two digits of the second symbol. The second byte uses the last four digits of the second symbol and first four non-prepended digits of the third symbol. The third byte uses the first two non-prepended digits of the third symbol and all six bits of the fourth symbol. Once the bytes are populated, it looks up the symbols for each byte in a table to produce the decoded string.

    Original Description:

    A pictorial explanation of how base-64 encoding works.

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    This document explains Rene Nyffenegger's base64 decoding algorithm. The algorithm works by taking the encoded 6-bit symbols, concatenating them into 8-bit bytes, and using bit shifting and masking to populate each byte. It populates the first byte using the first two digits of the first symbol and last two digits of the second symbol. The second byte uses the last four digits of the second symbol and first four non-prepended digits of the third symbol. The third byte uses the first two non-prepended digits of the third symbol and all six bits of the fourth symbol. Once the bytes are populated, it looks up the symbols for each byte in a table to produce the decoded string.

    Copyright:

    © All Rights Reserved
    Download as PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd
    Download as pdf or txt
    189 views12 pages

    Base64 Decoding Explained

    Uploaded by

    mmhorii
    This document explains Rene Nyffenegger's base64 decoding algorithm. The algorithm works by taking the encoded 6-bit symbols, concatenating them into 8-bit bytes, and using bit shifting and masking to populate each byte. It populates the first byte using the first two digits of the first symbol and last two digits of the second symbol. The second byte uses the last four digits of the second symbol and first four non-prepended digits of the third symbol. The third byte uses the first two non-prepended digits of the third symbol and all six bits of the fourth symbol. Once the bytes are populated, it looks up the symbols for each byte in a table to produce the decoded string.

    Copyright:

    © All Rights Reserved
    Download as PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd
    Download as pdf or txt
    of 12

    Rene Nyffeneggers base64

    Decoding Algorithm Explained


    Michael Horii

    Intro
    Were using Rene Nyffeneggers code to
    decode base64 strings.
    Code is available at:
    http://www.adpgmbh.ch/cpp/common/base64.html

    The following slides explain how the algorithm


    works.

    Encoded Symbols
    Suppose we have four encoded symbols to
    decode, where each symbol is represented by
    a 6-bit vector. For ease of illustration, well
    choose the encoded symbols as follows:
    Encoded Symbol 1: ES1 = 111111
    Encoded Symbol 2: ES2 = 000000
    Encoded Symbol 3: ES3 = 111111
    Encoded Symbol 4: ES4 = 000000

    Decoding the String


    To decode the base64 string, we concatenate the 6bit vectors, and group them in 8-bit vectors.
    ES=Encoded Symbol

    ES1

    ES2

    ES3

    ES4

    111111000000111111000000
    DS=Decoded Symbol

    DS1

    DS2

    DS3

    111111000000111111000000
    C

    Note we start with a


    4-symbol encoded
    string, and end up
    with a 3-symbol
    decoded string

    We match each 8-bit vector to a symbol using a


    look-up table.
    11111100 C
    00001111
    11000000

    A
    T

    The Catch
    This decoding process is straightforward
    conceptually, but the catch is that bytes are 8
    bits, while the encoded symbols are
    represented by 6-bit vectors.
    That means well need to use three operators
    to accomplish our goal of assembling the bits:
    Bit shifting
    Masking
    ORing

    Prepended Encoded Symbols


    When we assign a 6-bit vector to a (1-byte) char
    variable, two zeroes are prepended to the front
    of the 6-bit vector:
    111111 becomes 00111111
    000000 becomes 00000000
    Well refer to a prepended encoded symbol as PES:

    PES1 = 00111111
    PES2 = 00000000
    PES3 = 00111111
    PES4 = 00000000

    (ES1 = 111111)
    (ES2 = 000000)
    (ES3 = 111111)
    (ES4 = 000000)

    Aligning Bit Vectors


    Because were fitting 6-bit vectors into 8-bit
    containers, we need to align the 6-bit vectors
    using bit shifting.
    ES1

    ES2

    ES3

    ES4

    111111000000111111000000
    unsigned char PES1 = 0b111111;
    unsigned char PES2 = 0b000000;
    DS1
    PES1 shifted left by 2
    to align the bits

    DS2

    00111111
    00000000

    DS3

    111111000000111111000000
    00111111
    00000000 Apply mask to PES2 to get the two digits

    (underlined) needed for DS1, and then shift


    right by 4 to align the bits

    Plan of Action
    The following slides show in detail how the
    bytes are manipulated, from start to finish, to
    achieve our goal.
    Steps:
    Populate Byte 1 (DS1) using ES1 and ES2
    Populate Byte 2 (DS2) using ES2 and ES3
    Populate Byte 3 (DS3) using ES3 and ES4
    ES=Encoded Symbol

    ES1

    ES2

    ES3

    ES4

    111111000000111111000000
    DS=Decoded Symbol

    DS1

    DS2

    DS3

    111111000000111111000000

    Populating Byte 1
    Byte 1
    Prepended ES1 = PES1

    111111000000111111000000
    00111111

    Shift left by 2

    11111100
    11111100
    Prepended ES2 = PES2
    00000000
    Mask 00110000
    Apply Mask

    00000000

    Blue: Digits
    from ES1
    Orange: Digits
    from ES2

    PES1 << 2
    To populate Byte 1, we only want the first two nonprepended digits of ES2, so we use a mask to get these
    digits

    PES2 & 0x30

    Shift right by 4

    00000000
    00000000

    (PES2 & 0x30) >> 4

    11111100

    (PES1 << 2) | ((PES2 & 0x30) >> 4)

    Populating Byte 2
    Byte 2
    PES2

    111111000000111111000000
    00000000 To populate Byte 2, we only want the
    Mask 00001111
    last 4 digits of ES2, so we use a mask to
    Apply Mask

    get these digits

    00000000 PES2 & 0xf


    Shift left by 4

    00000000
    00000000
    00111111
    Mask 00111100

    PES3

    Apply Mask

    00111100
    Shift right by 2

    (PES2 & 0xf) << 4


    To populate Byte 2, we only want the first 4 nonprepended digits of ES3, so we use a mask to get
    these digits

    PES3 & 0x3c

    00001111
    00001111 (PES3 & 0x3c) >> 2
    00001111 ((PES2 << 0xf) << 4) | ((PES3 & 0x3c) >> 2)

    Populating Byte 3
    Byte 3
    PES3

    111111000000111111000000
    00111111
    Mask 00000011
    Apply Mask

    00000011

    PES3 & 0x3

    11000000
    00000000
    11000000

    (PES3 & 0x3) << 6

    Shift left by 6

    PES4

    PES4
    ((PES3 & 0x3) << 6) |PES4

    Putting It All Together


    Now we have three bytes, and concatenated
    we get the desired byte array.
    Byte 1

    Byte 2

    Byte 3

    111111000000111111000000
    C

    11111100
    00001111
    11000000

    C
    A
    T

    Decoding just requires using the lookup table


    to find out what symbol goes with Byte 1, Byte
    2, and Byte 3. Using the look-up table shown
    earlier, well get CAT as the decoded string.

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