What is the most efficient way to encode an arbitrary GUID into readable ASCII (33-127)?

Question

The standard string representation of GUID takes about 36 characters. Which is very nice, but also really wasteful. I am wondering, how to encode it in the shortest possible

Answer 1

Using the full range from 33 (what's wrong wirh space, incidentally?) to 127 gives you 95 possible characters. Expressing the 2^128 possible values of guid in base 95 will use 20 characters. This (modulo things like dropping nybbles that will be constant) is the best you can do. Save yourself the trouble - use base 64.