lionsoul2014/ip2region · error · ValueError

invalid bytes ip `{}`

Error message

invalid bytes ip `{}`

What it means

util.ip_to_string() formats packed IP bytes as a human-readable string, but only if the input is actually a bytes object; anything else raises ValueError('invalid bytes ip ...'). It is a strict input-type guard used in error messages and utilities.

Source

Thrown at binding/python/ip2region/util.py:75

        self.ipVersion, 
        self.runtimePtrBytes
    )


# ---
# ip parse and convert functions

def parse_ip(ip_string: str):
    try:
        return ipaddress.ip_address(ip_string).packed
    except:
        raise ValueError("invalid ip address `{}`".format(ip_string))

def ip_to_string(ip_bytes: bytes):
    if isinstance(ip_bytes, bytes):
        return str(ipaddress.ip_address(ip_bytes))
    else:
        raise ValueError("invalid bytes ip `{}`".format(ip_bytes))

def ip_compare(ip1: bytes, ip2: bytes):
    if ip1 > ip2:
        return 1
    elif ip1 < ip2:
        return -1
    else:
        return 0

def ip_sub_compare(ip1: bytes, buff: bytes, offset: int):
    ip2 = buff[offset:offset+len(ip1)]
    if ip1 > ip2:
        return 1
    elif ip1 < ip2:
        return -1
    else:
        return 0

View on GitHub (pinned to c1a1fc7d59)

Solutions

  1. Convert to bytes first: bytes(value) if it's bytearray/memoryview, or parse strings with util.parse_ip instead
  2. Check isinstance(ip_bytes, bytes) before calling
  3. For string IPs just print them directly instead of round-tripping through ip_to_string

Example fix

# before
util.ip_to_string('1.2.3.4')  # str, not bytes
# after
util.ip_to_string(util.parse_ip('1.2.3.4'))  # -> '1.2.3.4'
Defensive patterns

Strategy: type-guard

Validate before calling

if not isinstance(ip, bytes):
    ip = util.parse_ip(ip) if isinstance(ip, str) else bytes(ip)

Type guard

def is_packed_ip(v) -> bool:
    return isinstance(v, bytes) and len(v) in (4, 16)

Try / catch

try:
    text = util.ip_to_string(b)
except ValueError:
    text = str(b)  # fallback representation

Prevention

When it happens

Trigger: Calling ip_to_string with a str, bytearray, memoryview, int, or None instead of bytes/byte-like input.

Common situations: Passing the original string IP back into ip_to_string by mistake; passing a bytearray from decompression; logic that mixes str and bytes forms of the address.

Related errors

AI-assisted analysis of lionsoul2014/ip2region@c1a1fc7d59 (2026-09-02). Data as JSON: /api/errors/d5867e1dfd6c6469. Report an issue: GitHub.