[aklug] Re: [OT] Re: random bits vs random Hex

I learned something. It's that entropy can be measured in nats; other
fundamental units of information include the bit, which we've been
discussing, the ban, and the Qubit. And that Huffman coding is really a
special case of arithmetic coding. Different types of coding optimize for
(or are most efficient at representing) different frequency distributions.
Relates to the changing base thought problem.

jermudgeon

On Wed, May 29, 2013 at 11:39 AM, <bryanm@acsalaska.net> wrote:

> On Wed, May 29, 2013 8:31 am, Doug Davey wrote:
> > Nope, any decent algorithm won't even be able to tell the difference
> > between bases. Entropy isn't changed by how you view the data. And
> random
> > numbers are the bane of compression algorithms, but yes, they look for
> such
> > patterns.
>
> I don't know enough to address entropy, but I can say that changing
> from binary triplets to decimal digits leaves some of the pattern space
> unused (i.e. 8 and 9). In other words, the same data takes up more space,
> leaving open the possibility for an algorithm to compress it back to close
> to its original size.
>
> Of course, changing from decimal triplets to octal gives exactly the same
> representation of the data; the only difference is what you consider the
> possible values of each element to be.
>
> --
> Bryan Medsker
> bryanm@acsalaska.net
>
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Received on Wed May 29 15:33:33 2013