Data Formats

The choice of data formats used in a distributed system have an impact on the system’s possible functionality and performance. We have studied various existing data formats, both textual and binary, and we ended up designing a new, binary data format named RION (Raw Internet Object Notation). We had several requirements for what we perceive as “optimal”, and RION was designed to get as close to these requirements as possible. We are also studying the possibility of creating a textual version of RION, so it gets easier to read and write RION-like data in a standard text editor, as developers are used to do today with data formats like XML, JSON and YAML.