On: It's like JSON. but fast and small.

[pjscott]

Funny you should mention that. Msgpack uses a variable-length binary encoding for integers. It can, for example, fit integers in the interval [-32, 127] into a single byte. And unlike that fixed four-byte encoding you mention, it can also handle 64-bit integers.

(I'm not disagreeing with you, or anything. I just like talking about binary encodings.)

[jspthrowaway2 → pjscott]

There is also zigzag encoding, something Protocol Buffers (I believe) introduced for general usage. Thrift later copied it for the compact encoding.

It's pretty interesting.