[co_pilates]

It's just called a trie, and yes that's what the described structure is, just a trie on the binary representation of an ascii string. That's different from a search tree, which is used to order things. You can't serialize a trie into an ordered list as easily as a search tree, because that's what a search tree is for. A trie is better if you want to check if a key is already in the collection, because you only have to visit len(key) nodes.

I think we just need to realize not every software developer or engineer is a computer scientist, and we should hire more people with the title of computer scientist to help the engineers understand the best algorithms and structures to use. The engineers should be thinking about the bigger picture and should specialize in networking or databases or whatever. We're trying to make every "Software Engineer" into an expert on all levels of the stack, and it's starting to cause issues. You don't see mechanical engineers working on both fasteners (bolts, etc.) and reinforced cement structures at the same time, then tomorrow they design a centrifugal pump, and the next week they're in charge of the new V8 engine project, but as a Software Engineer I do that kind of switching everyday.