[ZODB-Dev] ZODB alternate serialization format patch

[Hanno Schlichting]

Shane Hathaway wrote:
> I have just created a patch for ZODB that makes the object serialization 
> format pluggable, meaning that it should now be possible to write Python 
> code that causes ZODB to store in formats other than Python pickles.

Cool :)

> In addition to making the data format pluggable, the patch puts most of 
> ZODB's dependencies on the cPickle module in one place, so now if we 
> decide to improve our usage of the cPickle module, we can make that 
> change in one place rather than several.

I'm wondering if this would be a good opportunity to include a version
marker in addition to the protocol format to the API's?

The ZODB still uses version one of the pickle protocol throughout and so
far it has been complicated and cumbersome to change this in any way.

While the documentation of Protocol Buffers mention that they try to be
stable and avoid incompatible versions, I don't trust any standard to be
so generic that it can avoid incompatible changes over a period of many
years.

Hanno