Title: Lossless Compression Handbook Author(s): Khalid Sayood Pages: 454 Publisher: Academic Press; 1st edition Publication date: 2002 Language: English Format: PDF ISBN-10: 0126208611 ISBN-13: Description: The 21 chapters in this handbook are written by the leading experts in the world on the theory, techniques, applications, and standards surrounding lossless compression. As with most applied technologies, the standards section is of particular importance to practicing design engineers. In order to create devices and communication systems that can communicate and be compatible with other systems and devices, standards must be followed. This book clearly explains the process of compression and transmission of multimedia signals. It is an invaluable resource for engineers dealing with image processing, signal processing, multimedia systems, wireless technology and more.
Compression schemes can be divided into two major classes: lossless compression schemes and lossy compression schemes. Data compressed using lossless compression schemes can be recovered exactly, while lossy compression introduces some loss of information in the reconstruction.
While the first modern compression scheme, Huffman coding, was a lossless compression scheme, most of the initial activity in the compression area focused on lossy compression. One reason was that the "data" being considered for compression was analognprimarily samples of speech waveforms. Another reason was that the device which would be used to provide the reconstructed speech to the user, namely, the telephone, introduced so much distortion of its own that it was relatively easy to design compression schemes which introduced less distortion than that to which the user was already being subjected.
In the past two decades the situation has changed dramatically. There is a significant amount of discrete data in the form of text, graphics, images, video, and audio that needs to be stored or transmitted, and display devices are of such quality that very little distortion can be tolerated. This has resulted in a resurgence of interest in lossless compressionnhence this handbook. We have tried to put together, in an accessible form, some of the most important aspects of lossless compression. The idea was to have a volume which would allow the reader to get an idea of both the depth and the breadth of the field while at the same time fulfilling the usual function of a handbookmthat of being a convenient repository of information about a topic. This combination will, we hope, be useful to both the novice reader who wishes to learn more about the subject, as well as the practitioner who needs an accessible reference book.
Review
Never before has the topic of lossless compression been so topical. That's why the recent publication of Lossless Compression Handbook,is so timely. - EMedia, The Digital Studio Magazine, May 2003
Overall, this book is a wonderful introduction and a handy reference to the topic of lossless compression. I recommend this book in the library of every working individual who is working in this area of lossless compression.
- IEEE Circuits & Devices Magazine, Sept./Oct. 2004
Title: Lossless Compression Handbook