Compression it is a compact representation of data.

Examples for the kind of data to compress:

- text
- source code
- arbitrary files
- images
- video
- audio data
- speech
different in terms of data volume, data structure, intended usage etc,
that is why it is plausible to develop specific compression technologies
for different data and application types, respectively.
Idea of general purpose compression technique for all thinkable
application scenarios has to be entirely abandoned.
Instead, there is a large number of very different techniques with
respect to target data types and target application environments (ex.
Data transmission in networks like streaming, storage and long term
archiving applications, interactive multimedia applications like gaming
etc)
Given this vast amount of different techniques, there are different ways
how to classify compression techniques?
Different ways how to classify compression techniques, depending on
the:
- type of data to be compressed
- target application area
- fundamental building blocks of the algorithms used
when talking about compression, we often mean lossy compression
while lossless compression is often termed as coding. However, not
all coding algorithm do actally lead to lossless compression (ex. Error
correction codes)
Like in every other field in computer science or engineering, the
dominating language in compression technologies is English of course.
There are hardly any comprehensive and up-to-date German books
available, and there do NOT exist any German journals in the field.
Basic Teminology:
Codec means a complete system capable of encoding and decoding
data which consists of an Encoder and a Decoder
Transcoding conversion from one encoded digital representation
into another one.
Compression rate (or Compression ration) defines the relation
between the size of the original data before compression and the size

of the compressed data. It rate the effectivity of a compression system

in terms of data reduction capability.
Purpose of compression:
- To efficiently use storage space
- To save on transmission capacity
- To save on transmission time
Basically its all about saving resources and money. Despite of the
overwhelming advances in the areas of storage media and
transmission networks it is actually quite a surprise that still
compression technology is required.
One important reason is that also the resolution and amount of
digital data has increased (x HDTV resolution, ever-increasing
sensor sizes in consumer cameras), and that there are still
application areas where resources are limited (ex wireless
networks).
Apart from the aim of simply reducing the amount of data,
standards like MPEG-4, MPEG-7, and MPEG-21 offer additional
functionalities.
During the last years, three important trends have contributed to
the fact that nowadays compression technology is as important as it
has ever been before this development has already changed the
way we work with multimedia data like text, speech, audio, images,
and video which will lead to new products and applications:
Three important factors/trends which describes the
importance/purpose of compression technology:
1. The availability of highly effective methods for compressing
various types of data
2. The availability of fast and cheap hardware components to
conduct compression on single-chip systems, microprocessors,
DSPs and VLSI systems
3. Convergence of computer, communication, consumer
electronics, publishing, and entertainment industries
The possibility to compress data:
Compression-enabling properties:
1. Statistical redundancy - in non-compressed data, all symbols are
represented with the same number of bits independent of their
relative frequency (fixed length representation)
2. Correlation adjacent data samples tend to be equal or similar
(example think of images or video data)

Types of correlation:
A. Spatial correlation
B. Spectral correlation
C. Temporal correlation
In addition, in many data types, there is a significant amount of
irrelevancy since the human brain is not able to process and/or
perceive the entire amount of data.
As a consequence, such data can be omitted without degrading
perception. Furthermore, some data contain more abstract
properties which are independent of time, location, and
resolution and can be described very efficiently (ex. Fractal
properties)

Historyofcompressiontechnologies
1st century B.C. Stenography
19th century Morse- and Braille alphabets
50ies of the 20th century compression technologies exploiting
statistical redundancy are developed : bit patterns with varying length
are used to represent individual symbols according to their relative
frequency
70ies dictionary algorithms are developed: symbol sequences are
mapped to shorter indices using dictionaries
70ies with the ongoing digitizationoftelephonelines

telecommunicationcompaniesgotinterestedinprocedureshowtoget
morechannelsonasinglewire.
early80iesfaxtransmissionoveranalogtelephonelines.
80iesfirstapplicationsinvolvingdigitalimagesappearonthe
market,thedigitalrevolutionstartswithcompressingaudiodata
90iesvideobroadcasting,videoondemand,etc.