79 lines
4.5 KiB
Markdown
79 lines
4.5 KiB
Markdown
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# Finite State Entropy
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This package provides Finite State Entropy encoding and decoding.
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Finite State Entropy (also referenced as [tANS](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asymmetric_numeral_systems#tANS))
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encoding provides a fast near-optimal symbol encoding/decoding
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for byte blocks as implemented in [zstandard](https://github.com/facebook/zstd).
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This can be used for compressing input with a lot of similar input values to the smallest number of bytes.
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This does not perform any multi-byte [dictionary coding](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dictionary_coder) as LZ coders,
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but it can be used as a secondary step to compressors (like Snappy) that does not do entropy encoding.
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* [Godoc documentation](https://godoc.org/github.com/klauspost/compress/fse)
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## News
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* Feb 2018: First implementation released. Consider this beta software for now.
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# Usage
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This package provides a low level interface that allows to compress single independent blocks.
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Each block is separate, and there is no built in integrity checks.
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This means that the caller should keep track of block sizes and also do checksums if needed.
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Compressing a block is done via the [`Compress`](https://godoc.org/github.com/klauspost/compress/fse#Compress) function.
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You must provide input and will receive the output and maybe an error.
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These error values can be returned:
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| Error | Description |
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|---------------------|-----------------------------------------------------------------------------|
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| `<nil>` | Everything ok, output is returned |
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| `ErrIncompressible` | Returned when input is judged to be too hard to compress |
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| `ErrUseRLE` | Returned from the compressor when the input is a single byte value repeated |
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| `(error)` | An internal error occurred. |
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As can be seen above there are errors that will be returned even under normal operation so it is important to handle these.
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To reduce allocations you can provide a [`Scratch`](https://godoc.org/github.com/klauspost/compress/fse#Scratch) object
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that can be re-used for successive calls. Both compression and decompression accepts a `Scratch` object, and the same
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object can be used for both.
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Be aware, that when re-using a `Scratch` object that the *output* buffer is also re-used, so if you are still using this
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you must set the `Out` field in the scratch to nil. The same buffer is used for compression and decompression output.
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Decompressing is done by calling the [`Decompress`](https://godoc.org/github.com/klauspost/compress/fse#Decompress) function.
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You must provide the output from the compression stage, at exactly the size you got back. If you receive an error back
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your input was likely corrupted.
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It is important to note that a successful decoding does *not* mean your output matches your original input.
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There are no integrity checks, so relying on errors from the decompressor does not assure your data is valid.
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For more detailed usage, see examples in the [godoc documentation](https://godoc.org/github.com/klauspost/compress/fse#pkg-examples).
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# Performance
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A lot of factors are affecting speed. Block sizes and compressibility of the material are primary factors.
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All compression functions are currently only running on the calling goroutine so only one core will be used per block.
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The compressor is significantly faster if symbols are kept as small as possible. The highest byte value of the input
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is used to reduce some of the processing, so if all your input is above byte value 64 for instance, it may be
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beneficial to transpose all your input values down by 64.
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With moderate block sizes around 64k speed are typically 200MB/s per core for compression and
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around 300MB/s decompression speed.
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The same hardware typically does Huffman (deflate) encoding at 125MB/s and decompression at 100MB/s.
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# Plans
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At one point, more internals will be exposed to facilitate more "expert" usage of the components.
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A streaming interface is also likely to be implemented. Likely compatible with [FSE stream format](https://github.com/Cyan4973/FiniteStateEntropy/blob/dev/programs/fileio.c#L261).
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# Contributing
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Contributions are always welcome. Be aware that adding public functions will require good justification and breaking
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changes will likely not be accepted. If in doubt open an issue before writing the PR.
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