gistfile1.txt

print '0b01110010 0b01100001 0b01100100'
0b01110010 0b01100001 0b01100100


perl -e 'print chr(0b01100001)'
a


print '0b01110010 0b01100001 0b01100100' | perl -lane 'print $_ for @F'
0b01110010                                                                      
0b01100001
0b01100100


print '0b01110010 0b01100001 0b01100100' | perl -lane 'for (@F) { $s=chr($_); print $s;}'
(NO OUTPUT)

perl -le '@a=qw(0b01110010 0b01100001 0b01100100); print chr($_) for @a;'
(NO OUTPUT)

perl -le '@a=(0b01110010, 0b01100001, 0b01100100); print chr($_) for @a;' # prints => r, a, d one per line

Perl interprets the items as strings in the second and third example, and chr(string) returns undef, I suppose. So you need a way to convince Perl that's a number. The function oct will do that:

echo '0b01110010 0b01100001 0b01100100' | perl -lane 'print chr(oct($_)) for @F'

See here: http://stackoverflow.com/questions/483655/how-do-i-convert-a-binary-string-to-a-number-in-perl

Probably the first time I've ever been annoyed by dynamic typing.