The q* stdlib docs

qencoding: base64 & hex codecs

qencoding provides the encoding.* built-ins: base64 and hex codecs implemented from scratch with zero third-party dependencies. base64 follows RFC 4648 (standard +/ alphabet with = padding); hex encodes to lowercase. Encoding takes a string (its UTF-8 bytes) or raw bytes and returns the encoded string; decoding takes the encoded string and returns the decoded text.

What it gives you#

qencoding registers four public built-ins, all single-argument, following the shared DMS convention.

Function	Input	Output	Notes
encoding.base64_encode	Str (UTF-8 bytes) or Bytes	Str	RFC 4648 standard alphabet, = padding.
encoding.base64_decode	Str	Str	Ignores whitespace and = padding.
encoding.hex_encode	Str (UTF-8 bytes) or Bytes	Str	Lowercase hex, two chars per byte.
encoding.hex_decode	Str	Str	Accepts upper or lower case; skips non-hex chars.

base64 details#

base64_encode uses the standard alphabet A-Z a-z 0-9 + / and pads the final group with = so the output length is always a multiple of four. base64_decode is forgiving: it filters out = padding and any ASCII whitespace before decoding, and ignores characters outside the alphabet, peeling out whole bytes from the bit stream.

Known vectors from the source confirm the encoder: "Man" encodes to TWFu, "Ma" to TWE=, and "M" to TQ==.

hex details#

hex_encode emits two lowercase hex digits per byte (digits 0-9 and a-f). hex_decode accepts both upper and lower case, drops any non-hex characters, and combines digits in pairs — a trailing odd digit is dropped. For example "AB" hex-encodes to 4142 (the ASCII codes of A and B).

Reusable library helpers#

base64_encode and base64_decode are also exposed as plain public functions (not just QQL built-ins) so other crates can reuse them directly — for instance the WebSocket handshake and the crypto package's password hashing both call base64_encode. The public encoding.* built-ins are reachable from QQL but not through that internal helper path.

Resource budget#

The encoding.* built-ins declare an empty resource request (no fixed memory or storage reservation) — they do lightweight, bounded byte-level work.

Example#

Encoding the string "Man" to base64 yields the canonical three-byte-to-four-char result.

Request

encoding.base64_encode("Man")

# wire form:
{ "0": { "Str": "Man" } }

Response

{ "result": { "Str": "TWFu" } }

Output

TWFu

Request

encoding.hex_encode("AB")
encoding.base64_decode("TWFu")

Response

{ "result": { "Str": "4142" } }
{ "result": { "Str": "Man" } }

Output

4142
Man