A Survey of JSON-compatible Binary Serialization Specifications
It addresses the problem of selecting appropriate serialization methods for developers and industries, but it is incremental as it synthesizes existing knowledge without introducing new techniques.
This paper surveys JSON-compatible binary serialization specifications, analyzing their history, characteristics, and use cases to compare schema-driven and schema-less approaches, with the result being a guide for informed decision-making without concrete numerical outcomes.
In this paper, we present the recent advances that highlight the characteristics of JSON-compatible binary serialization specifications. We motivate the discussion by covering the history and evolution of binary serialization specifications across the years starting from 1960s to 2000s and onwards. We analyze the use cases of the most popular serialization specifications across the industries. Drawing on the schema-driven (ASN.1, Apache Avro, Microsoft Bond, Cap'n Proto, FlatBuffers, Protocol Buffers, and Apache Thrift) and schema-less (BSON, CBOR, FlexBuffers, MessagePack, Smile, and UBJSON) JSON-compatible binary serialization specifications, we compare and contrast their inner workings through our analysis. We explore a set of non-standardized binary integer encoding techniques (ZigZag integer encoding and Little Endian Base 128 variable-length integer encoding) that are essential to understand the various JSON-compatible binary serialization specifications. We systematically discuss the history, the characteristics, and the serialization processes of the selection of schema-driven and schema-less binary serialization specifications and we identify the challenges associated with schema evolution in the context of binary serialization. Through reflective exercise, we explain our observations of the selection of JSON-compatible binary serialization specifications. This paper aims to guide the reader to make informed decisions on the choice between schema-driven or schema-less JSON-compatible binary serialization specifications.