+/* Same as pb_decode, except does not initialize the destination structure
+ * to default values. This is slightly faster if you need no default values
+ * and just do memset(struct, 0, sizeof(struct)) yourself.
+ *
+ * This can also be used for 'merging' two messages, i.e. update only the
+ * fields that exist in the new message.
+ *
+ * Note: If this function returns with an error, it will not release any
+ * dynamically allocated fields. You will need to call pb_release() yourself.
+ */
+bool pb_decode_noinit(pb_istream_t *stream, const pb_field_t fields[], void *dest_struct);
+
+/* Same as pb_decode, except expects the stream to start with the message size
+ * encoded as varint. Corresponds to parseDelimitedFrom() in Google's
+ * protobuf API.
+ */
+bool pb_decode_delimited(pb_istream_t *stream, const pb_field_t fields[], void *dest_struct);
+
+#ifdef PB_ENABLE_MALLOC
+/* Release any allocated pointer fields. If you use dynamic allocation, you should
+ * call this for any successfully decoded message when you are done with it. If
+ * pb_decode() returns with an error, the message is already released.
+ */
+void pb_release(const pb_field_t fields[], void *dest_struct);
+#endif
+
+
+/**************************************
+ * Functions for manipulating streams *
+ **************************************/
+
+/* Create an input stream for reading from a memory buffer.
+ *
+ * Alternatively, you can use a custom stream that reads directly from e.g.
+ * a file or a network socket.
+ */
+pb_istream_t pb_istream_from_buffer(uint8_t *buf, size_t bufsize);
+
+/* Function to read from a pb_istream_t. You can use this if you need to
+ * read some custom header data, or to read data in field callbacks.