On 2023-01-23 at 23:12:38 UTC-0500 (Mon, 23 Jan 2023 20:12:38 -0800)
John Cooper <mailmate@lists.freron.com>
is rumored to have said:
I think the "binary" designation is just a way to keep text programs
from understanding the file as a text-based file.
No, if 'file' says so, it's a binary plist:
~$ file Library/Preferences/com.freron.MailMate.plist
Library/Preferences/com.freron.MailMate.plist: Apple binary property
list
~$ hexdump -c $_ |head
0000000 b p l i s t 0 0 ? 020 ? \0 001 \0 002 \0
0000010 003 \0 004 \0 005 \0 006 \0 \a \0 \b \0 \t \0 \n \0
0000020 \v \0 \f \0 \r \0 016 \0 017 \0 020 \0 021 \0 022 \0
0000030 023 \0 024 \0 025 \0 026 \0 027 \0 030 \0 031 \0 032 \0
0000040 033 \0 034 \0 035 \0 036 \0 037 \0 \0 ! \0 " \0
0000050 # \0 $ \0 % \0 & \0 ' \0 ( \0 ) \0 * \0
0000060 + \0 , \0 - \0 . \0 / \0 0 \0 1 \0 2 \0
0000070 3 \0 4 \0 5 \0 6 \0 7 \0 8 \0 9 \0 : \0
0000080 ; \0 < \0 = \0 > \0 ? \0 @ \0 A \0 B \0
0000090 C \0 D \0 E \0 F \0 G \0 H \0 I \0 J \0
(BBEdit is one of the few programs that will attempt to open any file
you ask it to.)
I do not advise attempting to edit a binary plist in BBEdit. :)
The good news is that you can (at least thru Catalina) convert a binary
plist to the 'old text' or XML formats and the OS won't care. I believe
configd always writes in binary these days, but forward compatibility is
likely to always exist.
--
Bill Cole
b...@scconsult.com or billc...@apache.org
(AKA @grumpybozo and many *@billmail.scconsult.com addresses)
Not Currently Available For Hire
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