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Show HN: I got tired of Base64, so I made a numeric-only alternative

4 points| Forgret | 5 months ago

I created numbase is an alternative to Base64 that encodes data into a single large number instead of ASCII characters. It's useful if you want to store or transmit data in numeric form and easily apply compression algorithms like Huffman.

GitHub: https://github.com/Ferki-git-creator/numbase

7 comments

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BinaryIgor|5 months ago

Hmm - why would you do that? How much data, if any, can you safe by compressing it as to compared with the classic Base64?

Forgret|5 months ago

It depends on the data. Base64 adds ~33% overhead, while NUMBASE can be encoded into one large number at once and compressed with Huffman or other algorithms. For some data types this results in fewer extra characters.

a570xyz|5 months ago

I'm very curious as to how one gets tired of Base64?

Forgret|5 months ago

Base64 is great and widely used. I just wanted to experiment with a numeric-only representation. NUMBASE encodes everything into a single large number, which can make certain compression schemes like Huffman more efficient and opens up new ways to store or transmit data.