A comparison of how some scripting languages handle embedded nuls '\0' when iterating over lines. Note: Tcl does not return the end-of-line character.

gistfile1.txt

$ python io.py
12 hello.world.
12 hello.world.
12 hello.world.

$ ruby io.rb
12 hello.world.
12 hello.world.
12 hello.world.

$ tclsh io.tcl
11 hello.world
11 hello.world
11 hello.world

$ perl io.perl
12 hello.world.
12 hello.world.
12 hello.world.

$ lua io.lua
15  hellohellohello


$ cat io.py
def printable(c):
    return c if 32 < ord(c) < 128 else '.'

f = open('foo', 'r')
for l in f.readlines():
    print len(l), ''.join(printable(c) for c in l)


$ cat io.rb
File.open('foo').each do |l|
    l = l.gsub(/[\x00-\x1f]/, '.')
    print l.length, " #{l}\n"
end
$ cat io.tcl
set f [open foo]
while {1} {
    set line [gets $f]
    if {[eof $f]} {
        close $f
        break
    }
    regsub -all {[^\w()]} $line "." line
    puts "[string length $line] $line"
}

$ cat io.perl
open (MYFILE, 'foo');
 while (<MYFILE>) {
     $l = $_;
     $l=~s/[\x00-\x1F]+/./g;
     $len = length $l;
     print "$len $l\n";
 }
 close (MYFILE);

$ cat io.lua
function to_printable(c)
    local b = string.byte(c)
    if b > 32 and b < 128 then return c else return '.' end
end

f = io.open('foo')
for l in f:lines() do
    print(#l, (l:gsub('(.)', to_printable )))
end