implement and use DBOSJSON instead of JSON

[demetris-manikas]

This PR address #450

I chose the getTime() over toUTCString() since it consumes less space.

[qianl15]

I think the prefix could be more unique so we don't mistakenly deserialize other strings. For example, DBOSJsonDate or something like that.

[demetris-manikas]

Sure!
I was waiting for this.
Just name it!
Maybe add some of $%^@ as well.

[demetris-manikas]

What about using a library?
This one looks alive and kicking https://github.com/yahoo/serialize-javascript

[qianl15]

What about using a library? This one looks alive and kicking https://github.com/yahoo/serialize-javascript

Looks like this package doesn't support Buffer and:

For some use cases you might also need to deserialize the string. This is explicitly not part of this module.

We might find some better suited package later.

[demetris-manikas]

Updated to use DBOSJsonDate as prefix

[qianl15]

After discussing with the team, we're reconsidering this PR -- we think a safer way is to parse into an object (similar to the way we implemented Buffer replacer and reviver). Because the string with a prefix is still unsafe and will do a string matching for every single string.

After discussing with the team, we're reconsidering this PR

[qianl15]

Hi @demetris-manikas Thanks again for your contribution! We'd like to have two changes on this PR:

1. Instead of prefixing a string, we think a safer way is to use an object, similar to the way we implemented Buffer support. For example:

interface SerializedDate {
  dbos_type: 'dbos_Date';
  dbos_data: string;
}

2. Could you also replace JSON in all other places under src/? There are still some JSON in dbos-executor.ts, config.ts, fdb_system_database.ts, server.ts, and logs.ts.

[demetris-manikas]

Sure.
are you sure about the data being a string instead of a number?
and if so you want the toUTCString() to be used?

[qianl15]

Sure. are you sure about the data being a string instead of a number? and if so you want the toUTCString() to be used?

Let's use toISOString() as this is the default format used by JSON.

[demetris-manikas]

Applied all recommendations