[josefx]

> 1 bit sign (1= non-negative, 0= negative)

First time I ever saw a number where the leading sign bit has to be set to 1 to indicate non-negative.

[js2]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Offset_binary

[jnwatson]

Sorts better that way.

[karmakaze]

It would binary sort weird with negatives < 0 < positives but would put the largest magnitude negative closest to 0.

Also not Offset binary which uses 0111 for -1 rather than MySQL's 0001.