question: static String encode ( ByteBufferRange range ) { String start = Hex . encodeHexString ( toArray ( range . getStart ( ) ) ) ; String end = Hex . encodeHexString ( toArray ( range . getEnd ( ) ) ) ; int prefix = getCommonPrefixLength ( start , end ) ; return start . substring ( 0 , prefix ) + ':' + start . substring ( prefix ) + '-' + end . substring ( prefix ) ; }
target:  Returns a string that looks like "commonPrefix:startSuffix-endSuffix", hex-encoding the bytes.