Data Reduction and Compression in Database Systems

Abstract

Data compression is storing data such that it requires less space than usual. Data compression has been effectively used in storing data in a compressed form on magnetic tapes, disks, and even main memory. In many cases, updated data cannot be stored in place when it is not compressible to the same or smaller size. Compression also reduces the bandwidth requirements in transmitting (program) code, data, text, images, speech, audio, and video. The transmission may be from main memory to the CPU and its caches, from tape and disk into main memory, or over local, metropolitan, and wide area networks. When data compression is used, transmission time improves or, conversely, the required transmission bandwidth is reduced. Two excellent texts on this topic are Sayood (2002) and Witten, Bell, and Moffat (1999).