Compression is used just about everywhere. All the images you get on the web are compressed,

typically in the JPEG or GIF formats, most modems use compression, HDTV will be compressed

using MPEG-2, and several file systems automatically compress files when stored, and the rest of us do it by hand. The neat thing about compression, as with the other topics we will cover in this course, is that the algorithms used in the real world make heavy use of a wide set of algorithmic tools, including sorting, hash tables, tries, and FFTs. Furthermore, algorithms with strong theoretical foundations play a critical role in real-world applications.