Alex Shinn <xxxxxx@gmail.com> writes:

> The library style of reading and writing single different sized numbers
> at a time is especially well suited to such applications as writing a
> portable assembler.  However, an assembler invariably needs to read and
> write strings within the binary data, and SRFI-56 provides no portable
> means to do this.

An assembler does not write strings "within the binary data".
Remember, a string is a sequence of characters, not a sequence of
encodings.  Assemblers need to write specific numbers in specific
places, not "strings"; that is, they need control over the coding
used.  Which means they should encode the characters, and then write
numbers.