OTP-004: Auto Encoder

This proposal defines a way to automatically build a serialization layout for a given structure.

Motivation

Designing a serialization layout in TLB is a very risky task. Developers have to take care of the size limitations of cells and remember how many bits are used by each field. This is a very error-prone task and it is very easy to make a mistake. This proposal aims to solve this problem by providing a way to automatically build a serialization layout for a given structure.

Specification

We define auto-encoder as an eager algorithm that builds a serialization layout for a given structure. The algorithm is defined as follows:

Define available references and bits in a current cell 
   as `available_references` and `available_bits` respectively.
   NOTE: there must be at least one reference reserved for the serialization tail and one 
         bit for an optional flag. Depending on context more references or bits may be reserved. 

For each field in A:
    (size_bits, size_ref) = get_field_max_size(field);
    if (available_bits >= size_bits && available_references >= size_ref) {
        Push field to a current cell
    } else {
        available_references = (1023 - 1);
        available_bits = (4 - 1);
        Allocate a new tail and continue from the current field
    }

Drawbacks

• This is an implicit algorithm. It is not clear results of this allocator have to be checked to make compatible serialization.