Patent ID: 8044828

Claim:
A method for encoding a message communicated between a sender device and a receiver device, the message having at least one field for conveying predefined data fields and non-predefined data fields, the method comprising: inserting at the sender a reserve byte into a byte buffer for identifying the predefined data fields to be conveyed by the message, the reserve byte generated by: mapping each bit position of the reserve byte to one of the predefined data fields in the message; assigning a binary value to each bit position in the reserve byte based upon a value to be conveyed by the message in an associated predefined data field comprising: marking the bit position in the reserve byte associated with the predefined data field to indicate that a default value is to be conveyed by the message wherein the value is not stored in the byte buffer; and marking the bit position in the reserve byte associated with the predefined data field to indicate that a custom value is being conveyed in the associated predefined field position and inserting the custom value in the byte buffer; inserting into the byte buffer non-predefined data fields, wherein the non-predefined fields are not mapped to a bit position of the reserve byte, wherein the receiver can decode the message by extracting non-predefined fields and by determining from the reserve byte if known predefined values are to be used or if the custom value is to be extracted from the predefined data field in the message.