Data Compression I. Introduction In the modern era known as the “Information Age,” forms of electronic information are steadily becoming more important. Unfortunately, maintenance of data requires valuable resources in storage and transmission, as even the presence of information in storage re-quires some power. However, some of the largest files are those that are in formats re-plete with repetition, and thus are larger than they need to be. The study of data compres-sion is the science which attempts to advance toward methods that can be applied to data in order to make it take up less space. The uses for this are vast, and algorithms will need to be improved in order to sustain the inevitably larger files of the future. Thus, I decided to focus my research on the techniques that successful methods use in order to save space. My research question: What common features do good methods of data compression share? II. Mathematical Context The history of data compression is not so much a continent of improvement as it is an archipelago of dispersed -but related- innovations in the subject of information theory. The reason for this is mostly its relatively new development. Many topics in mathematics are now mostly researched in terms of computing. However, most of these subjects were already fairly developed before the arrival of computers. Cryptography, for example, was used since ancient times to keep information secret, and has only now developed into methods that assume the use of a computer. In contrast, computers are almost a require-ment for data compression as a theory to be of practical utilization: Analog information can easily be compressed by recording it in less space. Anyhow, there is rarely a need to store info... ... middle of paper ... ...hm).” “LZW.” „Minimum description length.” “Run-length Encoding.” “Shannon-Fano coding.” “Wikipedia:Citing Wikipedia” "Historical Notes: History [of data compression]." [Excerpt from book; A New Kind of Science, by Stephen Wolfram] ©2002 Stephen Wolfram. Wolfram Science. 31 July 2005 . Lynch, Thomas D. Data Compression: Techniques and Applications. Belmont, California, Lifetime Learning Productions. ©1985 Solomon, David. Data Compression: The Complete Reference. New York, Springer Verlag. ©1998 Appendix B: Mathematica Code for BLM 8
Due to compression, TV audio and video require less bandwidth and multiple digital TV channels can fit unto one satellite transponder as oppose to a single analogue channel occupying the whole transmission line.
The subject of this term paper will be about computers in the 1950’s. The divisions that will be covered are; the types of computers there were, the memory capacity of computers, the programming languages of that time, and the uses of the computers for that time. Information will be gathered from the Internet, from books, and from magazines, and from the encyclopedia.
Hipschma, Ron. " The Problem -- Mountains of Data." How SETI @Home Works (1999). 29 January 2000 http://www.nitehawk.com/rasmit/.
Works Cited The 1920s an Overview. Digital History. N.p., n.d. Web. The Web. The Web.
Computers are a magnificent feat of technology. They have grown from simple calculators to machines with many functions and abilities. Computers have become so common that almost every home has at least one computer, and schools find them a good source for information and education for their students (Hafner, Katie, unknown). Computers have created new careers and eliminated others and have left a huge impact on our society. The invention of the computer has greatly affected the arts, the business world, and society and history in many different areas, but to understand how great these changes are, it is necessary to take a look at the origins of the computer.
Currently the world has a wealth of data, stored all over the planet (the Internet and Web are prime examples), but it is needed to be understand that data. It has been stated that the amount of data doubles approximately
Ceruzzi, P. E. (1998). A history of modern computing (pp. 270-272). London, England: The MIT Press.
Mega Computer. "Reasons for the growing popularity of data mining." Online. Internet. 3 Oct. 1997 Available: http://www.megaputer.ru/dmreason.html.
Maxfield, C. and Brown, A. Retrieved Feb. 24, 2005, from The History of Computers Web site: http://www.maxmon.com.
The primary computer storage medium, before the introduction of magnetic storage, was punch cards. These were paper cards on which holes were punched to indicate binary data invented by Herman Hollerith in the late nineteenth century. In June 1949, a group of scientists and engineers in IBM began working on creating a new storage device that would soon revolutionize the industry. May 21, 1952 marked the transition from punched-card calculators to electronic computers as IBM introduced the IBM 726 Tape Unit [1]. It was used to store data in IBM’s first commercial scientific computer intended to help the US military to design aircrafts [2]. Four years later, IBM made the first computer disk storage system: the 305 RAMAC drive. Although this drive could only store 5MB of data, information could be stored directly to any location on the disk surface without having to read all the information in between which was the case in magnetic tapes. This ability to access random locations had a very important effect on computer performance and enabled data to be stored and retrieved much faster than tapes. The next 60 years saw a huge progress in the magnetic storage industry from a variety of hard disks to portable memory such as cassette tapes, floppy disks and zip drives. Today, one can store even 3TB data on tiny 3.5 inch drives. This was all possible due to electromagnetism and the magnetic properties of ferromagnetic materials such as the oxides of iron[ add the magnetism part]
The aim of this report is to theoretical cover data preservation, examination of digital evidence, tools and techniques for data capture, preservation and examination with a list of recommendations.
The fist computer, known as the abacus, was made of wood and parallel wires on which beads were strung. Arithmetic operations were performed when the beads were moved along the wire according to “programming” rules that had to be memorized by the user (Soma, 14). The second earliest computer, invented by Blaise Pascal in 1694, was a “digital calculating machine.” Pascal designed this first known digital computer to help his father, who was a tax collector. Pascal’s computer could only add numbers, and they had to be entered by turning dials (Soma, 32). It required a manual process like its ancestor, the abacus. Automation was introduced in the early 1800’s by a mathematics professor named Charles Babbage. He created an automatic calculation machine that was steam powered and stored up to 1000 50-digit numbers. Unlike its two earliest ancestors, Babbage’s invention was able to perform various operations. It relied on cards with holes punched in them, which are called “punch cards.” These cards carried out the programming and storing operations for the machine. Unluckily, Babbage’s creation flopped due to the lack of mechanical precision and the lack of demand for the product (Soma, 46). The machine could not operate efficiently because technology was t adequate to make the machine operate efficiently Computer interest dwindled for many years, and it wasn’t until the mid-1800’s that people became interested in them once again.
This white paper identifies some of the considerations and techniques which can significantly improve the performance of the systems handling large amounts of data.
The history of computers is an amazing story filled with interesting statistics. “The first computer was invented by a man named Konrad Zuse. He was a German construction engineer, and he used the machine mainly for mathematic calculations and repetition” (Bellis, Inventors of Modern Computer). The invention shocked the world; it inspired people to start the development of computers. Soon after,
The information can be expressed through words, numbers, sounds, and images. By better understanding digital technology, we improve our control over such information.