Working to Replace Strings with IDs in Greek Engine
Much of this afternoon has been spent updating all the messages and methods to stop using the string-based security keys and start using the 128-bit numeric security IDs. The reasons for this are many, but the most obvious ones are the size of the information, and the speed with with which it can be processed. We are getting into the time when we're looking at multiple kinds of clients, and in that we need to be able to do things very fast. Like crazy fast.
The parsing of the components in a string are OK for random use, but when a client needs to parse the strike (for instance), it's far faster to have it be an integer - even a varint, than an ASCII string that has to be walked and built up.
Unfortunately, this code touches nearly everything. So it's going to take a bit of time to take out the strings and replace them with the 128-bit integers. But we'll get there, and when we do, it'll be a better solution.