prefix coding

A coding system that uses (typically variable-length) codes that are distinguished by their "prefix property", which requires that there is no code word in the system that is a prefix (initial segment) of any other code word in the system.

Noun

  1. A coding system that uses (typically variable-length) codes that are distinguished by their "prefix property", which requires that there is no code word in the system that is a prefix (initial segment) of any other code word in the system.
    • A prefix coding can use a code with code words {9, 55}, as it has the prefix property. However, a code consisting of {9, 5, 59, 55} is not allowed, as "5" is a prefix of "59" and also of "55".

Forms

prefix codings prefix code

Hyponyms

Elias delta coding Elias gamma coding Elias omega coding Fibonacci coding Golomb Rice code Huffman coding Levenshtein coding Shannon–Fano coding Straddling checkerboard unary coding