A simple and efficient Real Time Communication Protocol
TLV is a simple (Type Length Vector) application protocol for communicating applicaitons. There are other options, that include ad-hoc formatting, where the package formats and handling are all specific to a single piece of communication. This requires anit-DRY coding practices and introduces bugs and stuff.
By sticking to a simple, but well defined library, many of the required inter-system communications can be handled seamlessly.
We could go with something like, JSON (not a bad choice), or RPC (hrmm), or XML (please God, No!). But each of these choices are a little heavy weight in terms of Bandwidth, Memory and processing required.
For real time communications (except for streaming media) most communications are short and often bursty. However, the messages are typically sort but need to be communicated rapidly.
In this case it makes sense to use a protocol that is very simple, yet does require a "tight coupleing" between the applicaitons that are communicating.
The type of message will determine how long it is, and how much data it can pass around.
Short Code:
+----+----+
|1 | ~ 1 - byte compact message
+----+----+
Type Only
+----+----+----+----+
|01 | | ~ 2 - byte short message
+----+----+----+----+
Type & Length
+----+----+----+----+----+----+
|00 | | .... ~ 2 - 256bytes (2^7)
+----+----+----+----+----+----+
Type Length & Data