Jim,

> I've been thinking a new data streaming message format for use in
> the new API, the remote protocol, BLR, and, maybe at some time in
> the future, the ODS. T Here are some ideas to bounce around.

Have you considered ASN.1 for specifying new data format (wire, ODS,
etc)? If yes, why doesn't it fit our needs? Because your description
sounds very like one of the encoding rules in ASN.1.

Roman