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From: metzger@garfield.columbia.edu.UUCP
Newsgroups: sci.crypt,comp.sys.ibm.pc,comp.sources.wanted
Subject: Re: Need information on data compression algorithms
Message-ID: <4550@columbia.UUCP>
Date: Thu, 16-Apr-87 10:59:56 EST
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Posted: Thu Apr 16 10:59:56 1987
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In article <1323@ihdev.ATT.COM> pdg@ihdev.UUCP (Joe Isuzu) writes:
>Unless you take symbolic representation into account.  Say you
>numbered the (2^14)-1 words, and used that to replace just the
>absolute matches (forgetting about endings etc), you would already be
>elimintating more than you claim, before even implementing redundancy
>techniques.  If you read a little more on the subject, you would
>realize there is more than one way to skin a cat.

Sorry, you still lose. If you do that, you are not compressing an
ARBITRARY text that much. For instance, if I have 256 books in my
library, and each one of them contains say a million words (I know
that is big) you can then compress any book in the library down to 8
bits, provided that you know that the text you are transmitting is in
the library. But then, you see, you are not compressing an ARBITRARY
text, only a text you can find in that limited library. If I pick
completely random text I can't do that.

Enough of this.

.pm