What are the limitations of using codepages like Windows-1252 for converting binary files to text in PHP, and what alternative methods can be used for conversion?

Using codepages like Windows-1252 for converting binary files to text in PHP can lead to data loss or corruption, especially when dealing with non-ASCII characters. To avoid this issue, it is recommended to use functions that support multibyte character encodings, such as mb_convert_encoding(), along with specifying the correct encoding for the input binary data.

// Read binary data from a file
$binaryData = file_get_contents('binary_file.bin');

// Convert binary data to UTF-8 encoded text
$textData = mb_convert_encoding($binaryData, 'UTF-8', 'Windows-1252');

// Output the converted text
echo $textData;