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compression |
3 definitions found From Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary (1913) [web1913]: Compression \Com*pres"sion\, n. [L. compressio: cf F. compression.] The act of compressing, or state of being compressed. ``Compression of thought.'' --Johnson. From WordNet r 1.6 [wn]: compression n 1: an increase in the density of something [syn: {compaction}, {concretion}, {densification}] 2: the process or result of becoming smaller or pressed together: "the contraction of a gas on cooling" [syn: {condensation}, {contraction}] 3: encoding information while reducing the bandwidth or bits required [ant: {decompression}] 4: applying pressure [syn: {compressing}] [ant: {decompression}] From The Free On-line Dictionary of Computing (13 Mar 01) [foldoc]: compression 1.(Or "compaction") The coding of data to save storage space or transmission time. Although data is already coded in digital form for computer processing, it can often be coded more efficiently (using fewer bits). For example, {run-length encoding} replaces strings of repeated characters (or other units of data) with a single character and a count There are many compression {algorithms} and utilities. Compressed data must be decompressed before it can be used The standard {Unix} compression utilty is called {compress} though {GNU}'s superior {gzip} has largely replaced it Other compression utilties include {pack}, {zip} and {PKZIP}. When compressing several similar files, it is usually better to join the files together into an {archive} of some kind (using {tar} for example) and then compress them rather than to join together individually compressed files. This is because some common compression {algorithm}s build up tables based on the data from their current input which they have already compressed. They then use this table to compress subsequent data more efficiently. See also {TIFF}, {JPEG}, {MPEG}, {Lempel-Ziv Welch}, "{lossy}", "{lossless}". {Compression FAQ (ftp://rtfm.mit.edu/pub/usenet/news.answers/compression-faq/)}. {Usenet} newsgroups: {news:comp.compression}, {news:comp.compression.research}. 2. Reducing the dynamic range of an audio signal, making quiet sounds louder and loud sounds quieter. Thus when discussing digital audio, the preferred term for reducing the total amount of data is "compaction". Some advocate this term in all contexts. (2001-01-30)
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