The order statistics based list decoding techniques for linear binary block
codes of small to medium block length are investigated. The construction of the
list of the test error patterns is considered. The original order statistics
decoding is generalized by assuming segmentation of the most reliable
independent positions of the received bits. The segmentation is shown to
overcome several drawbacks of the original order statistics decoding. The
complexity of the order statistics based decoding is further reduced by
assuming a partial ordering of the received bits in order to avoid the complex
Gauss elimination. The probability of the test error patterns in the decoding
list is derived. The bit error rate performance and the decoding complexity
trade-off of the proposed decoding algorithms is studied by computer
simulations. Numerical examples show that, in some cases, the proposed decoding
schemes are superior to the original order statistics decoding in terms of both
the bit error rate performance as well as the decoding complexity.Comment: 17 pages, 2 tables, 6 figures, submitted to IEEE Transactions on
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