[erlang-questions] port_command and marshalling

[Paul Oliver]

Hi,

I have a port open with opts [{packet, 4}, binary] and call it using:

port_command(Port, term_to_binary(Msg)),

With the definition of  receive_erlang_port_msg below, for a
particular call, I get:

lengthstr[0]=0
lengthstr[1]=0
lengthstr[2]=5
lengthstr[3]=-103
LEN=-103

Does anyone know where the -103 comes from?

Is there any standard marshalling code I can lift?

Thanks!
Paul.

byte* receive_erlang_port_msg(void)
{
    int i, len = 0;
    byte *buffer;
    byte lengthstr[4];

    if (read_exact(lengthstr, 4) !=4) {
		exit(1);
    }

	for (i=0;i<4;i++) {
		fprintf(stderr,"lengthstr[%d]=%d\n",i, lengthstr[i]);
	}

	len = (unsigned) lengthstr[3];
	len |= ((unsigned) lengthstr[2]) << 8;
	len |= ((unsigned) lengthstr[1]) << 16;
	len |= ((unsigned) lengthstr[0]) << 24;

	fprintf(stderr, "LEN=%d\n", len);

    buffer = (byte *)malloc(len);

    if (read_exact(buffer, len) <= 0) {
		exit(1);
    }

    return buffer;
}