How to set Bytes data in firebase using flutter?

Question

The Cloud FireStore supports Bytes datatype, but failed to give an example of how to setting it, i am trying to upload a thumbnail image as bytes to the FireStore, in Flutter. Can someone give an example how to do it?

File imageFile;
final databaseReference = Firestore.instance;
    await databaseReference
        .collection("Users")
        .document('${user.strId}')
        .setData({'thumbnailPhoto': ???}); // how to convert imageFile to Bytes?

EDIT I think both of the answers posted by Richard Heap and Jay Vasan work, using blob or base64Encode actually give the same value in FireStore under key thumbnailPhoto. I decide to give the bounty to Richard since it hides the details of the internal binary coding.

Answer 1

Cloud Firestore raw bytes is represented by Blob in Dart, so use:

    .setData({'thumbnailPhoto', Blob(await file.readAsBytes())});

When you read this back from Cloud Firestore you'll get back a Blob. Access its bytes with blob.bytes. For example, to write to a file use:

  await file.writeAsBytes(theBlob.bytes); // overwrite or create the file

Answer 2

In this case, you can convert the image to base64 string.

open image as:

var imageFile = File(imagePath);

convert to base64:

String base64Image = base64Encode(imageFile.readAsBytesSync());