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14 - Block-Sorting Compression

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  08 June 2023

Paolo Ferragina
Affiliation:
Università di Pisa
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Summary

This chapter describes a data compression technique devised by Mike Burrows and David Wheeler in 1994 at DEC Systems Research Center. This technique is known as the Burrows–Wheeler Transform (or BWT) and offers a revolutionary alternative to dictionary-based and statistical compressors. It is the algorithmic core of a new class of data compressors (such as bzip2), as well as of new powerful compressed indexes (such as the FM-index). The chapter describes the algorithmic details of the BWT and of two other simple compressors, Move-to-Front and Run-Length Encoding, whose combination constitutes the design core of bzip-based compressors. This description is accompanied by the theoretical analysis of the impact of BWT on data compression, in terms of the k-th order empirical entropy of the input data, and by a sketch of the main algorithmic issues that underlie the design of the first provably compressed suffix array to date, namely the FM-index. Given the technicalities involved in the description of the BWT and the FM-index, this chapter offers several running examples and illustrative figures which should ease their understanding.

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Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2023

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