[python] TypeError: a bytes-like object is required, not 'str'

The following is the code that tries to modify the input supplied by a user by using sockets:

from socket import *

serverName = '127.0.0.1'
serverPort = 12000
clientSocket = socket(AF_INET, SOCK_DGRAM)
message = input('Input lowercase sentence:')
clientSocket.sendto(message,(serverName, serverPort))
modifiedMessage, serverAddress = clientSocket.recvfrom(2048)
print (modifiedMessage)
clientSocket.close()

When I execute it and supply input the following error occurs:

Input lowercase sentence:fdsgfdf
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "C:\srinath files\NETWORKS\UDPclient.py", line 6, in <module>
    clientSocket.sendto(message,(serverName, serverPort))
TypeError: a bytes-like object is required, not 'str'

What can I do to solve this?

This code is probably good for Python 2. But in Python 3, this will cause an issue, something related to bit encoding. I was trying to make a simple TCP server and encountered the same problem. Encoding worked for me. Try this with sendto command.

clientSocket.sendto(message.encode(),(serverName, serverPort))

Similarly you would use .decode() to receive the data on the UDP server side, if you want to print it exactly as it was sent.

A bit of encoding can solve this:

Client Side:

message = input("->")
clientSocket.sendto(message.encode('utf-8'), (address, port))

Server Side:

data = s.recv(1024)
modifiedMessage, serverAddress = clientSocket.recvfrom(message.decode('utf-8'))

Whenever you encounter an error with this message use my_string.encode().

^{(where my_string is the string you're passing to a function/method).}

The encode method of str objects returns the encoded version of the string as a bytes object which you can then use. In this specific instance, socket methods such as .send expect a bytes object as the data to be sent, not a string object.

Since you have an object of type str and you're passing it to a function/method that expects an object of type bytes, an error is raised that clearly explains that:

TypeError: a bytes-like object is required, not 'str'

So the encode method of strings is needed, applied on a str value and returning a bytes value:

>>> s = "Hello world"
>>> print(type(s))
<class 'str'>
>>> byte_s = s.encode()
>>> print(type(byte_s))
<class 'bytes'>
>>> print(byte_s)
b"Hello world"

Here the prefix b in b'Hello world' denotes that this is indeed a bytes object. You can then pass it to whatever function is expecting it in order for it to run smoothly.

Encoding and decoding can solve this in Python 3:

Client Side:

>>> host='127.0.0.1'
>>> port=1337
>>> import socket
>>> s=socket.socket(socket.AF_INET,socket.SOCK_STREAM)
>>> s.connect((host,port))
>>> st='connection done'
>>> byt=st.encode()
>>> s.send(byt)
15
>>>

Server Side:

>>> host=''
>>> port=1337
>>> import socket
>>> s=socket.socket(socket.AF_INET,socket.SOCK_STREAM)
>>> s.bind((host,port))
>>> s.listen(1)
>>> conn ,addr=s.accept()
>>> data=conn.recv(2000)
>>> data.decode()
'connection done'
>>>

Simply replace message parameter passed in clientSocket.sendto(message,(serverName, serverPort)) to clientSocket.sendto(message.encode(),(serverName, serverPort)). Then you would successfully run in in python3