Are there any real life uses for the Java byte primitive type?

Question

For some inexplicable reason the byte primitive type is signed in Java. This mean that valid values are -128..127 instead of the usual 0..255 range representin

Answer 1

I think it is signed in order to be consistent with short and int.

As to whether it is used much, it makes the notion of "byte arrays" a construct rather than a primitive.

That's really all I have. :)