US Patent 7068192 System and method for encoding and decoding variable-length data

A system and method for encoding and decoding variable-length data includes storing data values in a data structure including a data field and a tag field. The data field includes one or more variable-length data subfields capable of storing variable-length data (e.g., 1 to N bytes of data). In some embodiments, the data subfields and the tag field of the data structure each start on a byte boundary which simplifies decoding. The tag field includes one or more tag subfields, each corresponding to the one or more data subfields. Each tag subfield includes one or more tag bits which indicate the length of the data stored in the corresponding data subfield. Unpacking or decompressing data values from the data structure can be achieved by using a look-up table of offsets and masks, thus reducing the number of bit operations needed to unpack data values from the data structure.