I have to send minimal (location) data to a server from a mobile device. For convenience reasons (PHP-compatibility) I don’t just send it as a raw query string or post data, I send it as a variable for example:
a=12345,6789
The question is, which letter should I choose (as the name of the variable instead of a) if I want to be a good neighbor on the internet and create the most compressible chunk of data (as some hops may use gzip or other compression).
Edit
(For all the naysayers out there).
The amount of compression achievable depend on the bit stream itself. A total random bit stream (with the lowest possible entropy) is the least compressible. A uniform bit stream (all zeroes or all ones) is the most.
AFAIK, gzip is based on huffman coding => Frequently occuring characters are the cheapest upon compression. So you should probably use the character that occurs most frequently in your POST data.
If ‘a=12345,6789’ is the only content you post, I don’t think it matters what character you choose for the variable name. On the other hand, if you post a bigger chunk of content, then using a character that occurs frequently in that content would be the best choice.