What i need to do is this: Have a php file in a webserver, doing a POST with binary payload to a fast-cgi written in c++, and the c++ should deserialize that payload into a known struct. something like: struct whatever { int a; int b; float c; std::vector<int> d; } (mainly structs consisting of basic types and collections of basic types) I've been playing around with boost::serialization, but i can't seem to comprehend the binary format it generates (So i could hardcode the php to make a valid payload to be deserialised from the fast-cgi). And not so important: i've noticed boost::serialization to binary archives always look like: serialization::archive ÃõH@ can't i get rid of the "serialization::archive" thing that is obviusly not part of the struct i just serialized? Thanks a lot for your help. I'd appreciate any other ideas to accomplish the same result :).