endless compression

[markw at mohawksoft.com (markw at mohawksoft.com)]

Jules has mentioned that he has a compressor that will compress compressed
files. I looked at this a while back and it is a really cool idea.

It is theoretically possible.

Use conventional compression at first. Numerically speaking, a
traditionally compressed file is interresting because it has virtually no
repeating numbers. It is also unlikely to have any serious non-random
seeming number sequences.

As such, this file may be able to be described with fewer bites than it
contains. That, my friends, is the nature of compression.

There are a number of theories and scenarios with which people propose
this sort of compressor. Some think like Huffmann where you have
compression tables at each end. Some think like LZ where you have a self
decribing bit pattern.

Like I said, it is theoretically possible, but no one, that I know, has
made a workable/viable example.