Re: Extensions to the `base64' Program

[Pádraig Brady]

On 02/09/15 20:15, Ray Dillinger wrote:
> 
> 
> On 08/31/2015 06:39 AM, Pádraig Brady wrote:
> 
>>   There are probably other variants of base64 in use
>>   (like also transforming the '=' padding char for
>>   easier to read URLs), and so using the external tr
>>   solution is more general.
> 
> FYI, Base58, base64, and hexadecimal are fairly common ways to
> express cryptographic keys, and there is no available command
> line tool to transcode hex or base64 to and from base58.
> 
> Base58 is also used in encoding short URLs.
> 
> Base58 is essentially base64 restricted to alphanumerics
> (hence by default compatible with URLs, double-click selection,
> command lines that shells won't parse to something unexpected,
> etc) minus characters which could easily be visually confused.
> 
> At present there are three incompatible but semi-standard
> versions of it. Here's a handy URL:
> 
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Base58
> 
> Would coreutils like a command-line tool to do this?

Interesting.
I think there would need to be bit more standardization
for it to be appropriate for a general tool in coreutils.

thanks,
Pádraig