Cast int to byte[4] in .NET

Question

I was wondering if anyone here knows an efficient way to cast an integer to a byte[4]? I'm trying to write an int into MemoryStream, and this thing wants me to give it bytes

Answer 1

You can use BitConverter.GetBytes if you want to convert a primitive type to its byte representation. Just remember to make sure the endianness is correct for your scenario.

Answer 2

Use a BinaryWriter (constructed with your memory stream); it has a write method that takes an Int32.

BinaryWriter bw = new BinaryWriter(someStream);
bw.Write(intValue);
bw.Write((Int32)1);
// ...