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If you've ever used JSON between processes, then QSN is the exact same idea. JSON strings are also encoded (but they can't represent byte strings). There are

by chubot 6y ago

If you've ever used JSON between processes, then QSN is the exact same idea. JSON strings are also encoded (but they can't represent byte strings). There are probably people who never use JSON, and that's fine, but there are a lot more who do! The goal is absolutely for tools like grep to adopt QSN support. [1] Another argument is that in networking framing, you have a few choices: (1) delimiter-based (NUL bytes) (2) escaping (QSN with \) (3) length prefixed (netstrings) So Oil supports #1 and #2 now. Oil doesn't support netstrings but it actually does make sense, and avoids encoding/decoding. Though QSN encoding can be made extremely fast, just like it's been done with JSON [2]. [1] GNU grep actually has the ASCII/binary detection problem that was brought up on HN awhlie ago. Honestly it would be worth making a "slow correct utf-8/QSN grep" that avoids this. https://unix.stackexchange.com/questions/19907/what-makes-grep-consider-a-file-to-be-binary https://unix.stackexchange.com/questions/19907/what-makes-gr... [2] https://github.com/simdjson/simdjson https://github.com/simdjson/simdjson

l0b0 6y ago
> If you've ever used JSON between processes, then QSN is the exact same idea. JSON strings are also encoded (but they can't represent byte strings). I don't see how they are anything like the same idea. JSON is an object serialization format. These objects may contain strings, and the encoding of those strings unfortunately is not binary-complete. But most importantly objects have structure. QSN is a binary string encoding format, and has no structure outside of the sequence of bytes. In any case I'm not sure why you keep bringing up JSON. On the other hand, if it wasn't for the fact that JSON is so strongly tied to JavaScript QSN might've been a good string encoding format for it. > There are probably people who never use JSON, and that's fine, but there are a lot more who do! The goal is absolutely for tools like grep to adopt QSN support. [1] I know what the words mean (and I've been using JSON and grep for years), but I don't understand what that sentence means. > Another argument is that in networking framing, you have a few choices: I don't know what "networking framing" is. If you mean actual network packet structure, I don't expect you'll be able to convince a single network engineer that QSN is a better choice than netstrings. In any case, I'm going to have to shut down this thread now. I don't expect anyone else is reading this, I'm not learning anything new, and I can't convince you that QSN is a bad idea for IPC.

by chubot 6y ago

l0b0 6y ago

> If you've ever used JSON between processes, then QSN is the exact same idea. JSON strings are also encoded (but they can't represent byte strings). I don't see how they are anything like the same idea. JSON is an object serialization format. These objects may contain strings, and the encoding of those strings unfortunately is not binary-complete. But most importantly objects have structure. QSN is a binary string encoding format, and has no structure outside of the sequence of bytes. In any case I'm not sure why you keep bringing up JSON. On the other hand, if it wasn't for the fact that JSON is so strongly tied to JavaScript QSN might've been a good string encoding format for it. > There are probably people who never use JSON, and that's fine, but there are a lot more who do! The goal is absolutely for tools like grep to adopt QSN support. [1] I know what the words mean (and I've been using JSON and grep for years), but I don't understand what that sentence means. > Another argument is that in networking framing, you have a few choices: I don't know what "networking framing" is. If you mean actual network packet structure, I don't expect you'll be able to convince a single network engineer that QSN is a better choice than netstrings. In any case, I'm going to have to shut down this thread now. I don't expect anyone else is reading this, I'm not learning anything new, and I can't convince you that QSN is a bad idea for IPC.