Stepped through? Yes..as I hinted, coming from an embedded environment, and measured compared highly optimized json parsing code (that even had much limitations

Stepped through? Yes..as I hinted, coming from an embedded environment, and measured compared highly optimized json parsing code (that even had much limitations, like very limited nesting, no lists) vs nanopb => clear winner on all points (memory reqs, performance, encoded size) - which is really not that surprising?