Patent ID: 7472334

Claim:
A computerized method for encoding digital information for protection from data loss in storage or memory or in transmission on communication paths using a linear transformation defined by an (m+k)×m coding matrix A over a Galois Field GF(2 q ), said encoding method comprising the steps of: assembling an m×l vector x comprised of components x j from m data chunks representing the digital information, each chunk comprising q hyperwords each of an identical but arbitrary number of bits; and multiplying said vector x by said matrix A, comprised of elements A ij , using the operations provided by a MultiplyAndAdd(y i , A ij , x j ) subroutine to produce an (m+k)×l vector y of m+k chunks y i that are resilient to the erasure of any k chunks, said operations including jumping to or otherwise executing a predetermined sequence of instructions that are unique to the binary value of A ij , each of said predetermined sequence of instructions consisting of a bitwise XOR of a hyperword of chunk x j with and stored in a hyperword of chunk y i .