Assuming the storage size is important: I have a long list of digits (0-9) that I want to write to a file. From a storage standpoint, would it be more efficient to use ASCII or UTF-8 as an encoding? Is it possible to create a smaller file using something else?
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2 Answers
There's no difference between ASCII and UTF-8 when storing digits. A tighter packing would be using 4 bits per digit (BCD).
If you want to go below that, you need to take advantage of the fact that long sequences of 10-base values can be presented as 2-base (binary) values.
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There is absolutely no difference in this case; UTF-8 is identical to ASCII in this character range.
If storage is an important consideration, maybe look into compression. A simple Huffman compression will use something like 3 bits per byte for this kind of data. If there are periodicity patterns, a modern compression algorithm can take it even further.
