This is a modification of the utility I made in yesterday’s post, chunk, and most of the information mentioned in that post applies to this one too. This utility instead writes bytes from STDIN to a certain byte offset of a preexisting file. Below is the source code for the result, which I call chunkwrite (Windows Executable).

Chunkwrite writes bytes to a file at a given offset from STDIN. The parameters are:
1) The file to write to
2) The byte offset to write at (hex is supported like 0xA)

//Copyright 2009 by Dakusan (http://www.castledragmire.com/Copyright). Licensed under Dakusan License v2.0 (http://www.castledragmire.com/Misc/Software_Licenses/Dakusan_License_v2.0.php).
//See http://www.castledragmire.com/Posts/chunkwrite for more information

#define __LARGE64_FILES
#include <stdio.h>
#include <stdlib.h> //strtoull

#ifdef WIN32 //STDIN only needs to be set to binary mode in windows
	#include <io.h> //_setmode
	#include <fcntl.h> //_O_BINARY
#endif

typedef unsigned long long UINT64;
const UINT64 MaxSizeToRead=1024*1024*10; //The maximum number of bytes to read at a time to our buffer (Must be < 2^31)

UINT64 GetNumberFromString(const char* S) //Extract both hexidecimal and decimal numbers from a string
{
	bool IsHex=S[0]=='0' && (S[1]|32=='x'); //If string starts as 0x, then is a hex number
	return strtoull(S+(IsHex ? 2 : 0), NULL, IsHex ? 16 : 10); //Hex number starts after 2 characters and uses base 16
}

int main(int argc, char *argv[], char *envp[])
{
	//Determine if proper number of parameters are passed, and if not, output help info
	if(argc!=3)
		return fprintf(stderr, "Chunkwrite writes bytes to a file at a given offset from STDIN. The parameters are:\n1) The file to write to\n2) The byte offset to write at (hex is supported like 0xA)\n") & 0;

	//Open the file to output to
	FILE *TheFile=fopen64(argv[1], "r+b");
	if(TheFile==NULL)
		return fprintf(stderr, "File not found or cannot open file\n") & 0;

	//Determine the requested start offset
	UINT64 Offset=GetNumberFromString(argv[2]);

	//Write the data 10MB at a time from STDIN to the file
	char *Buffer=new char[MaxSizeToRead];
	fseeko64(TheFile, Offset, SEEK_SET); //Seek to the beginning write offset of our file
	#ifdef WIN32 //STDIN only needs to be set to binary mode in windows
		_setmode(_fileno(stdin), _O_BINARY);
	#endif
	do
	{
		size_t AmountRead=fread(Buffer, 1, MaxSizeToRead, stdin); //Read the data from STDIN
		fwrite(Buffer, AmountRead, 1, TheFile); //Write the data to the file
	}
	while(!feof(stdin)); //Keep reading and writing until STDIN is complete

	//Cleanup
	delete[] Buffer;
	fclose(TheFile);
	return 1;
}

I needed a command line utility for Bash (for both Windows and Linux) that only outputs bytes between 2 points in a file to STDOUT. head and tail weren’t really cutting it so I figured I’d throw something together. Below is the source code for the result, which I call chunk (Windows Executable).

I compiled the file as c++, but it should be c99 compatible. The file has been tested as compilable for: GCC4 on Slackware, GCC3 on Red Hat, and GCC3 on MingW (Windows [WIN32 should be defined by the compiler]).

Chunk outputs bytes between 2 points in a file to STDOUT. The parameters are:
1) The file
2) The byte offset to start at (hex is supported like 0xA)
3) The number of bytes to output. If not given, the end of the file is assumed.

//Copyright 2009 by Dakusan (http://www.castledragmire.com/Copyright). Licensed under Dakusan License v2.0 (http://www.castledragmire.com/Misc/Software_Licenses/Dakusan_License_v2.0.php).
//See http://www.castledragmire.com/Posts/chunk for more information

#define __LARGE64_FILES
#include <stdio.h>
#include <stdlib.h> //strtoull

#ifdef WIN32 //STDOUT only needs to be set to binary mode in windows
	#include <io.h> //_setmode
	#include <fcntl.h> //_O_BINARY
#endif

typedef unsigned long long UINT64;
const UINT64 MaxSizeToRead=1024*1024*10; //The maximum number of bytes to read at a time to our buffer (Must be < 2^31)

UINT64 GetNumberFromString(const char* S) //Extract both hexidecimal and decimal numbers from a string
{
	bool IsHex=S[0]=='0' && (S[1]|32=='x'); //If string starts as 0x, then is a hex number
	return strtoull(S+(IsHex ? 2 : 0), NULL, IsHex ? 16 : 10); //Hex number starts after 2 characters and uses base 16
}

int main(int argc, char *argv[], char *envp[])
{
	//Determine if proper number of parameters are passed, and if not, output help info
	if(argc!=3 && argc!=4)
		return fprintf(stderr, "Chunk outputs bytes between 2 points in a file to STDOUT. The parameters are:\n1) The file\n2) The byte offset to start at (hex is supported like 0xA)\n3) The number of bytes to output. If not given, the end of the file is assumed.\n") & 0;

	//Open the file and get its length
	FILE *TheFile=fopen64(argv[1], "rb");
	if(TheFile==NULL)
		return fprintf(stderr, "File not found or cannot open file\n") & 0;
	fseeko64(TheFile, 0, SEEK_END); //Get the length by seeking to the end
	UINT64 FileSize=ftello64(TheFile);

	//Determine the requested start offset
	UINT64 Offset=GetNumberFromString(argv[2]), SizeToOutput;
	if(Offset>=FileSize)
	{
		fprintf(stderr, "Offset is larger than file's size\n");
		fclose(TheFile);
		return 0;
	}

	//Determine the size to read
	if(argc==3) //If no final parameter, read to the end of the file
		SizeToOutput=FileSize-Offset;
	else //Determine from the 3rd parameter
	{
		SizeToOutput=GetNumberFromString(argv[3]);
		if(Offset+SizeToOutput>FileSize)
		{
			fprintf(stderr, "Requested size is larger than the file, truncating to end of file\n");
			SizeToOutput=FileSize-Offset;
		}
		else if(!SizeToOutput) //If nothing to output, exit prematurely
		{
			fclose(TheFile);
			return 1;
		}
	}

	//Output requested data 10MB at a time from the file to STDOUT
	char *Buffer=new char[SizeToOutput>MaxSizeToRead ? MaxSizeToRead : SizeToOutput]; //Only allocate as many bytes to our read buffer as is necessary
	fseeko64(TheFile, Offset, SEEK_SET); //Seek to the beginning read offset of our file
	#ifdef WIN32 //STDOUT only needs to be set to binary mode in windows
		_setmode(_fileno(stdout), _O_BINARY);
	#endif
	while(SizeToOutput) //Keep reading and outputting until requested data is complete
	{
		UINT64 SizeToRead=SizeToOutput>MaxSizeToRead ? MaxSizeToRead : SizeToOutput; //Number of bytes to read and write
		fread(Buffer, SizeToRead, 1, TheFile); //Read the data
		fwrite(Buffer, SizeToRead, 1, stdout); //Write the data to STDOUT
		SizeToOutput-=SizeToRead; //Decrease number of bytes we still need to read
	}

	//Cleanup
	delete[] Buffer;
	fclose(TheFile);
	return 1;
}