The Rightmost Equal-Cost Position Problem

LZ77-based compression schemes compress the input text by replacing factors in the text with an encoded reference to a previous occurrence formed by the couple (length, offset). For a given factor, the smallest is the offset, the smallest is the resulting compression ratio. This is optimally achieved by using the rightmost occurrence of a factor in the previous text. Given a cost function, for instance the minimum number of bits used to represent an integer, we define the Rightmost Equal-Cost Position (REP) problem as the problem of finding one of the occurrences of a factor which cost is equal to the cost of the rightmost one. We present the Multi-Layer Suffix Tree data structure that, for a text of length n, at any time i, it provides REP(LPF) in constant time, where LPF is the longest previous factor, i.e. the greedy phrase, a reference to the list of REP({set of prefixes of LPF}) in constant time and REP(p) in time O(|p| log log n) for any given pattern p

Optimal Parsing for Dictionary Text Compression

Dictionary-based compression algorithms include a parsing strategy to transform the input text into a sequence of dictionary phrases. Given a text, such process usually is not unique and, for compression purpose, it makes sense to find one of the possible parsing that minimize the final compression ratio. This is the parsing problem. An optimal parsing is a parsing strategy or a parsing algorithm that solve the parsing problem taking account of all the constraints of a compression algorithm or of a class of homogeneous compression algorithms. Compression algorithm constrains are, for instance, the dictionary itself, i.e. the dynamic set of available phrases, and how much a phrase weights on the compressed text, i.e. the number of bits of which the codeword representing such phrase is composed, also denoted as the encoding cost of a dictionary pointer. In more than 30th years of history of dictionary based text compression, while plenty of algorithms, variants and extensions appeared and while dictionary approach to text compression became one of the most appreciated and utilized in almost all the storage and communication processes, only few optimal parsing algorithms were presented. Many compression algorithms still leaks optimality of their parsing or, at least, proof of optimality. This happens because there is not a general model of the parsing problem that includes all the dictionary based algorithms and because the existing optimal parsing algorithms work under too restrictive hypothesis. This work focus on the parsing problem and presents both a general model for dictionary based text compression called Dictionary-Symbolwise Text Compression theory and a general parsing algorithm that is proved to be optimal under some realistic hypothesis. This algorithm is called iii Dictionary-Symbolwise Flexible Parsing and it covers almost all of the known cases of dictionary based text compression algorithms together with the large class of their variants where the text is decomposed in a sequence of symbols and dictionary phrases. In this work we further consider the case of a free mixture of a dictionary compressor and a symbolwise compressor. Our Dictionary-Symbolwise Flexible Parsing covers also this case. We have indeed an optimal parsing algorithm in the case of dictionary-symbolwise compression where the dictionary is prefix closed and the cost of encoding dictionary pointer is variable. The symbolwise compressor is any classical one that works in linear time, as many common variable-length encoders do. Our algorithm works under the assumption that a special graph that will be described in the following, is well defined. Even if this condition is not satisfied, it is possible to use the same method to obtain almost optimal parses. In detail, when the dictionary is LZ78-like, we show how to implement our algorithm in linear time. When the dictionary is LZ77-like our algorithm can be implemented in time O(n log n). Both have O(n) space complexity. Even if the main aim of this work is of theoretical nature, some experimental results will be introduced to underline some practical effects of the parsing optimality in terms of compression performance and to show how to improve the compression ratio by building extensions Dictionary- Symbolwise of known algorithms. Finally, some more detailed experiments are hosted in a devoted appendix

Relations Between Greedy and Bit-Optimal LZ77 Encodings

This paper investigates the size in bits of the LZ77 encoding, which is the most popular and efficient variant of the Lempel--Ziv encodings used in data compression. We prove that, for a wide natural class of variable-length encoders for LZ77 phrases, the size of the greedily constructed LZ77 encoding on constant alphabets is within a factor $O(\frac{\log n}{\log\log\log n})$ of the optimal LZ77 encoding, where $n$ is the length of the processed string. We describe a series of examples showing that, surprisingly, this bound is tight, thus improving both the previously known upper and lower bounds. Further, we obtain a more detailed bound $O(\min\{z, \frac{\log n}{\log\log z}\})$, which uses the number $z$ of phrases in the greedy LZ77 encoding as a parameter, and construct a series of examples showing that this bound is tight even for binary alphabet. We then investigate the problem on non-constant alphabets: we show that the known $O(\log n)$ bound is tight even for alphabets of logarithmic size, and provide tight bounds for some other important cases.Peer reviewe

Efficient string algorithmics across alphabet realms

Stringology is a subfield of computer science dedicated to analyzing and processing sequences of symbols. It plays a crucial role in various applications, including lossless compression, information retrieval, natural language processing, and bioinformatics. Recent algorithms often assume that the strings to be processed are over polynomial integer alphabet, i.e., each symbol is an integer that is at most polynomial in the lengths of the strings. In contrast to that, the earlier days of stringology were shaped by the weaker comparison model, in which strings can only be accessed by mere equality comparisons of symbols, or (if the symbols are totally ordered) order comparisons of symbols. Nowadays, these flavors of the comparison model are respectively referred to as general unordered alphabet and general ordered alphabet. In this dissertation, we dive into the realm of both integer alphabets and general alphabets. We present new algorithms and lower bounds for classic problems, including Lempel-Ziv compression, computing the Lyndon array, and the detection of squares and runs. Our results show that, instead of only assuming the standard model of computation, it is important to also consider both weaker and stronger models. Particularly, we should not discard the older and weaker comparison-based models too quickly, as they are not only powerful theoretical tools, but also lead to fast and elegant practical solutions, even by today's standards

Dictionary-Symbolwise Flexible Parsing

International audienceLinear time optimal parsing algorithms are very rare in the dictionary based branch of the data compression theory. The most recent is the Flexible Parsing algorithm of Mathias and Shainalp that works when the dictionary is prefix closed and the encoding of dictionary pointers has a constant cost. We present the Dictionary-Symbolwise Flexible Parsing algorithm that is optimal for prefix-closed dictionaries and any symbolwise compressor under some natural hypothesis. In the case of LZ78-alike algorithms with variable costs and any, linear as usual, symbolwise compressor it can be implemented in linear time. In the case of LZ77-alike dictionaries and any symbolwise compressor it can be implemented in O(n log(n)) time. We further present some experimental results that show the effectiveness of the dictionary-symbolwise approach

Dictionary-Symbolwise Flexible Parsing

International audienceLinear time optimal parsing algorithms are very rare in the dictionary based branch of the data compression theory. The most recent is the Flexible Parsing algorithm of Mathias and Shainalp that works when the dictionary is prefix closed and the encoding of dictionary pointers has a constant cost. We present the Dictionary-Symbolwise Flexible Parsing algorithm that is optimal for prefix-closed dictionaries and any symbolwise compressor under some natural hypothesis. In the case of LZ78-alike algorithms with variable costs and any, linear as usual, symbolwise compressor it can be implemented in linear time. In the case of LZ77-alike dictionaries and any symbolwise compressor it can be implemented in O(n log(n)) time. We further present some experimental results that show the effectiveness of the dictionary-symbolwise approach

Optimal Parsing for Dictionary-Based Compression

Dictionary-based compression algorithms include a parsing strategy to transform the input text into a sequence of dictionary phrases. Given a text, such process usually is not unique and, for compression purposes, it makes sense to find one of the possible parsing that minimise the final compression ratio. This is the parsing problem. In more than 30 years of history of dictionary-based text compression only few optimal parsing algorithms were presented. Most of the practical dictionary-based compression solutions need or prefer to factorise the input data into a sequence of dictionary-phrases and symbols. Those two output categories are usually encoded via two different encoders producing a compressed output that is a mixture of two compressors. This book contains a review of many dictionary-based compression schemes, their theoretical basis, a focus on the parsing problem and related problems, a recent theoretical model for such compression schemes, and an optimal solution called Dictionary-Symbolwise Flexible Parsing that covers almost all the classic dictionary-based compression schemes and the more general Dictionary-Symbolwise variant, where letters and dictionary references are compressed via different variable-length encoders