blob-util

blob-util is a Blob library for busy people.

It offers a small set of cross-browser utilities for translating Blobs to and from different formats:

• <img/> tags
• base 64 strings
• binary strings
• ArrayBuffers
• data URLs
• canvas

It's also a good pairing with the attachment API in PouchDB.

Note: this is a browser library. For Node.js, see Buffers.

Topics:

• Install
• Browser support
• Tutorial
• Playground
• API

Install

Via npm:

npm install blob-util

ES modules are supported:

import { canvasToBlob } from 'blob-util'
canvasToBlob(canvas, 'image/png').then(/* ... */)

Or as a script tag:

<script src="https://unpkg.com/blob-util/dist/blob-util.min.js"></script>

Then it's available as a global blobUtil object:

blobUtil.canvasToBlob(canvas, 'image/png').then(/* ... */)

Browser support

As of v2.0.0, a built-in Promise polyfill is no longer provided. Assuming you provide a Promise polyfill, the supported browsers are:

• Firefox
• Chrome
• Edge
• IE 10+
• Safari 6+
• iOS 6+
• Android 4+
• Any browser with either Blob or the older BlobBuilder; see caniuse for details.

Tutorial

Blobs (binary large objects) are the modern way of working with binary data in the browser. The browser support is very good.

Once you have a Blob, you can make it available offline by storing it in IndexedDB, PouchDB, LocalForage, or other in-browser databases. So it's the perfect format for working with offline images, sound, and video.

A File is also a Blob. So if you have an <input type="file"> in your page, you can let your users upload any file and then work with it as a Blob.

Example

Here's Kirby. He's a famous little Blob.

So let's fulfill his destiny, and convert him to a real Blob object.

var img = document.getElementById('kirby');
 
blobUtil.imgSrcToBlob(img.src).then(function (blob) {
  // ladies and gents, we have a blob
}).catch(function (err) {
  // image failed to load
});

(Don't worry, this won't download the image twice, because browsers are smart.)

Now that we have a Blob, we can convert it to a URL and use that as the source for another <img/> tag:

var blobURL = blobUtil.createObjectURL(blob);
 
var newImg = document.createElement('img');
newImg.src = blobURL;
 
document.body.appendChild(newImg);

So now we have two Kirbys - one with a normal URL, and the other with a blob URL. You can try this out yourself in the blob-util playground. Super fun!

API

Index

Functions

• arrayBufferToBinaryString
• arrayBufferToBlob
• base64StringToBlob
• binaryStringToArrayBuffer
• binaryStringToBlob
• blobToArrayBuffer
• blobToBase64String
• blobToBinaryString
• blobToDataURL
• canvasToBlob
• createBlob
• createObjectURL
• dataURLToBlob
• imgSrcToBlob
• imgSrcToDataURL
• revokeObjectURL

Functions

arrayBufferToBinaryString

▸ arrayBufferToBinaryString(buffer: ArrayBuffer): string

Convert an ArrayBuffer to a binary string.

Example:

var myString = blobUtil.arrayBufferToBinaryString(arrayBuff)

Parameters:

Returns: string binary string

arrayBufferToBlob

▸ arrayBufferToBlob(buffer: ArrayBuffer, type?: string): Blob

Convert an ArrayBuffer to a Blob.

Example:

var blob = blobUtil.arrayBufferToBlob(arrayBuff, 'audio/mpeg');

Parameters:

Returns: Blob Blob

base64StringToBlob

▸ base64StringToBlob(base64: string, type?: string): Blob

Convert a base64-encoded string to a Blob.

Example:

var blob = blobUtil.base64StringToBlob(base64String);

Parameters:

Returns: Blob Blob

binaryStringToArrayBuffer

▸ binaryStringToArrayBuffer(binary: string): ArrayBuffer

Convert a binary string to an ArrayBuffer.

var myBuffer = blobUtil.binaryStringToArrayBuffer(binaryString)

Parameters:

Returns: ArrayBuffer array buffer

binaryStringToBlob

▸ binaryStringToBlob(binary: string, type?: string): Blob

Convert a binary string to a Blob.

Example:

var blob = blobUtil.binaryStringToBlob(binaryString);

Parameters:

Returns: Blob Blob

blobToArrayBuffer

▸ blobToArrayBuffer(blob: Blob): Promise<ArrayBuffer>

Convert a Blob to an ArrayBuffer.

Example:

blobUtil.blobToArrayBuffer(blob).then(function (arrayBuff) {
  // success
}).catch(function (err) {
  // error
});

Parameters:

Returns: Promise<ArrayBuffer> Promise that resolves with the ArrayBuffer

blobToBase64String

▸ blobToBase64String(blob: Blob): Promise<string>

Convert a Blob to a binary string.

Example:

blobUtil.blobToBase64String(blob).then(function (base64String) {
  // success
}).catch(function (err) {
  // error
});

Parameters:

Returns: Promise<string> Promise that resolves with the binary string

blobToBinaryString

▸ blobToBinaryString(blob: Blob): Promise<string>

Convert a Blob to a binary string.

Example:

blobUtil.blobToBinaryString(blob).then(function (binaryString) {
  // success
}).catch(function (err) {
  // error
});

Parameters:

Returns: Promise<string> Promise that resolves with the binary string

blobToDataURL

▸ blobToDataURL(blob: Blob): Promise<string>

Convert a Blob to a data URL string (e.g. 'data:image/png;base64,iVBORw0KG...').

Example:

var dataURL = blobUtil.blobToDataURL(blob);

Parameters:

Returns: Promise<string> Promise that resolves with the data URL string

canvasToBlob

▸ canvasToBlob(canvas: HTMLCanvasElement, type?: string, quality?: number): Promise<Blob>

Convert a canvas to a Blob.

Examples:

blobUtil.canvasToBlob(canvas).then(function (blob) {
  // success
}).catch(function (err) {
  // error
});

Most browsers support converting a canvas to both 'image/png' and 'image/jpeg'. You may also want to try 'image/webp', which will work in some browsers like Chrome (and in other browsers, will just fall back to 'image/png'):

blobUtil.canvasToBlob(canvas, 'image/webp').then(function (blob) {
  // success
}).catch(function (err) {
  // error
});

Parameters:

Returns: Promise<Blob> Promise that resolves with the Blob

createBlob

▸ createBlob(parts: Array<any>, properties?: * BlobPropertyBag | string*): Blob

Shim for new Blob() to support older browsers that use the deprecated BlobBuilder API.

Example:

var myBlob = blobUtil.createBlob(['hello world'], {type: 'text/plain'});

Parameters:

Returns: Blob Blob

createObjectURL

▸ createObjectURL(blob: Blob): string

Shim for URL.createObjectURL() to support browsers that only have the prefixed webkitURL (e.g. Android <4.4).

Example:

var myUrl = blobUtil.createObjectURL(blob);

Parameters:

Returns: string url

dataURLToBlob

▸ dataURLToBlob(dataURL: string): Blob

Convert a data URL string (e.g. 'data:image/png;base64,iVBORw0KG...') to a Blob.

Example:

var blob = blobUtil.dataURLToBlob(dataURL);

Parameters:

Returns: Blob Blob

imgSrcToBlob

▸ imgSrcToBlob(src: string, type?: string, crossOrigin?: string, quality?: number): Promise<Blob>

Convert an image's src URL to a Blob by loading the image and painting it to a canvas.

Note: this will coerce the image to the desired content type, and it will only paint the first frame of an animated GIF.

Examples:

blobUtil.imgSrcToBlob('https://mysite.com/img.png').then(function (blob) {
  // success
}).catch(function (err) {
  // error
});

blobUtil.imgSrcToBlob('https://some-other-site.com/img.jpg', 'image/jpeg',
                         'Anonymous', 1.0).then(function (blob) {
  // success
}).catch(function (err) {
  // error
});

Parameters:

Returns: Promise<Blob> Promise that resolves with the Blob

imgSrcToDataURL

▸ imgSrcToDataURL(src: string, type?: string, crossOrigin?: string, quality?: number): Promise<string>

Convert an image's src URL to a data URL by loading the image and painting it to a canvas.

Note: this will coerce the image to the desired content type, and it will only paint the first frame of an animated GIF.

Examples:

blobUtil.imgSrcToDataURL('https://mysite.com/img.png').then(function (dataURL) {
  // success
}).catch(function (err) {
  // error
});

blobUtil.imgSrcToDataURL('https://some-other-site.com/img.jpg', 'image/jpeg',
                         'Anonymous', 1.0).then(function (dataURL) {
  // success
}).catch(function (err) {
  // error
});

Parameters:

Returns: Promise<string> Promise that resolves with the data URL string

revokeObjectURL

▸ revokeObjectURL(url: string): void

Shim for URL.revokeObjectURL() to support browsers that only have the prefixed webkitURL (e.g. Android <4.4).

Example:

blobUtil.revokeObjectURL(myUrl);

Parameters:

Returns: void

Credits

Thanks to the rest of the PouchDB team for figuring most of this crazy stuff out.

Building the library

npm install
npm run build

Testing the library

npm install

Then to test in the browser using Saucelabs:

npm test

Or to test locally in your browser of choice:

npm run test-local

To build the API docs and insert them in the README:

npm run doc