# Encoding of realtime data

**URL:** https://opendataforum.transport.nsw.gov.au/t/encoding-of-realtime-data/47
**Category:** App development
**Created:** [April 19, 2016, 12:51am UTC](https://opendataforum.transport.nsw.gov.au/t/encoding-of-realtime-data/47 "2016-04-19T00:51:42Z")
**Posts on this page:** 4
**Page:** 1

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### Author: ![BenCousins](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/flex019/user_avatar/opendataforum.transport.nsw.gov.au/bencousins/32/203_2.png) [@BenCousins](https://opendataforum.transport.nsw.gov.au/u/BenCousins)
#### Post date: [April 19, 2016, 12:51am UTC](https://opendataforum.transport.nsw.gov.au/t/encoding-of-realtime-data/47/1 "2016-04-19T00:51:42Z")

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Hi.

I’m relatively new to APIs, and the like. I’m just wondering how the GTFS realtime data is encoded, because I’m getting a lot of “`��ָ�`” type characters when I pull it as UTF-8.

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### Author: ![Nirving](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/flex019/user_avatar/opendataforum.transport.nsw.gov.au/nirving/32/218_2.png) [@Nirving](https://opendataforum.transport.nsw.gov.au/u/Nirving)
#### Post date: [April 19, 2016, 1:20am UTC](https://opendataforum.transport.nsw.gov.au/t/encoding-of-realtime-data/47/2 "2016-04-19T01:20:56Z")

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Take a look @ [GTFS Realtime Overview &nbsp;|&nbsp; Realtime Transit &nbsp;|&nbsp; Google Developers](https://developers.google.com/transit/gtfs-realtime/#data-format)  
Or use any of the GTFS Realtime libraries @ [https://developers.google.com/transit/gtfs-realtime/code-samples](https://developers.google.com/transit/gtfs-realtime/code-samples)

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### Author: ![BenCousins](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/flex019/user_avatar/opendataforum.transport.nsw.gov.au/bencousins/32/203_2.png) [@BenCousins](https://opendataforum.transport.nsw.gov.au/u/BenCousins)
#### Post date: [April 19, 2016, 1:29am UTC](https://opendataforum.transport.nsw.gov.au/t/encoding-of-realtime-data/47/3 "2016-04-19T01:29:38Z")

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I did - I was expecting a JSON feed to come straight from the server. Oops :L

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### Author: ![4WiFi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/4/d78d45/32.png) [@4WiFi](https://opendataforum.transport.nsw.gov.au/u/4WiFi)
#### Post date: [April 19, 2016, 2:59am UTC](https://opendataforum.transport.nsw.gov.au/t/encoding-of-realtime-data/47/4 "2016-04-19T02:59:46Z")

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BINARY data is returned. the PHP libraries work easily and process very quickly too. Have not tried the others. You can get a JSON like result if you set debug=true, but you will not get the whole dataset doing that (only for debug purposes of course).