Dictionary of Computer and Internet Terms: BinHex
BinHex
a Macintosh utility for encoding binary files so that they can be transmitted as text through electronic mail systems and the like. (See binary file; text file; electronic mail.) A BinHex file is an encoded representation of a binary file, but the BinHex file consists only of printable characters arranged in lines of reasonable length. Specifically, the BinHex file consists of one hex digit (0-9, A-F) for each four bits of data in the original file. Thus the BinHex file is about twice as long as the original.
