How to convert a string or integer to binary in Ruby?

Question

How do you create integers 0..9 and math operators + - * / in to binary strings. For example:

 0 = 0000,
 1 = 0001, 
 ...
 9 = 1001

Is the

Answer 1

You would naturally use Integer#to_s(2), String#to_i(2) or "%b" in a real program, but, if you're interested in how the translation works, this method calculates the binary representation of a given integer using basic operators:

def int_to_binary(x)
  p = 0
  two_p = 0
  output = ""

  while two_p * 2 <= x do
    two_p = 2 ** p
    output << ((two_p & x == two_p) ? "1" : "0")
    p += 1
  end

  #Reverse output to match the endianness of %b
  output.reverse
end

To check it works:

1.upto(1000) do |n|
  built_in, custom = ("%b" % n), int_to_binary(n)
  if built_in != custom
    puts "I expected #{built_in} but got #{custom}!"
    exit 1
  end
  puts custom
end