updated docs and added StringBuilder to our native serialization

Author: gwhalin

doc/HOWTO.txt

@@ -111,6 +111,38 @@ there are two settings to handle this.
 	pool.setFailback( false );
 
 
+Serialization:
+==============
+
+For java "native types", which include:
+
+Boolean
+Byte
+String
+Character
+StringBuffer
+StringBuilder
+Short
+Long
+Double
+Float
+Date
+Integer
+
+The client will by default *NOT* use java serialization, and instead
+will serialize using the primitive values to save space.  You can
+override this by using the mcc.setPrimitiveAsString( true ), which
+will use the toString representation of the object.
+
+For other java objects, you need to make sure the class implements
+Serializable in order to be able to be stored in the cache.
+
+I would also reccomend that if possible, classes should instead
+implement Externalizable as opposed to Serializable.  This allows the
+author of the class to define how objects of that class should
+serialize.  In practice at Meetup.com, we saw a 60% reduction in the size
+of our serialized objects by doing this.  This means less data to eat up
+cache space and less data to transfer over the network.
 
 Other:
 ======

src/com/danga/MemCached/NativeHandler.java

@@ -106,6 +106,7 @@ public class NativeHandler {
     public static final int MARKER_SHORT            = 9;
     public static final int MARKER_DOUBLE           = 10;
     public static final int MARKER_DATE             = 11;
+    public static final int MARKER_STRINGBUILDER    = 12;
 
     public static boolean isHandled( Object value ) {
 
@@ -114,6 +115,7 @@ public static boolean isHandled( Object value ) {
              value instanceof String          ||
              value instanceof Character       ||
              value instanceof StringBuffer    ||
+             value instanceof StringBuilder   ||
              value instanceof Short           ||
              value instanceof Long            ||
              value instanceof Double          ||
@@ -153,6 +155,9 @@ public static byte[] encode( Object value ) throws Exception {
         if ( value instanceof StringBuffer )
             return encode( (StringBuffer)value );
 
+        if ( value instanceof StringBuilder )
+            return encode( (StringBuilder)value );
+
         if ( value instanceof Short )
             return encode( (Short)value );
 
@@ -256,6 +261,15 @@ public static byte[] encode( StringBuffer value ) throws Exception {
 
     }
 
+    public static byte[] encode( StringBuilder value ) throws Exception {
+
+        byte[] b = encode( value.toString() );
+        b[0] = MARKER_STRINGBUILDER;
+        
+        return b;
+        
+    }
+
     public static byte[] encode( Short value ) throws Exception {
 
         byte[] b = encode( (int)value.shortValue() );
@@ -426,6 +440,12 @@ public static StringBuffer decodeStringBuffer( byte[] b ) throws Exception {
 
     }
 
+    public static StringBuilder decodeStringBuilder( byte[] b ) throws Exception {
+
+        return new StringBuilder( decodeString( b ) );
+        
+    }
+
     public static Short decodeShort( byte[] b ) throws Exception {
 
         //FIXME: this generates an extra object we don't need