Patent ID: 8456333

Claim:
A method of separating solid data blocks with stationary informational characteristics in an input data set, comprising the steps of: (a) beginning the formation of the first solid block (B) from the first small block (b) in a sequence of small blocks in the input data set; (b) sequentially collecting statistics for small blocks b in the input data set; (c) calculating for each block b the relative change in the estimated compression efficiency for the solid block B currently being formed caused by merging the statistics of the block B with the statistics of the block b collected in step (b) and using the merged statistics for probability estimation; (d) deciding in each case whether any block b should be added to a block B by comparing the relative change calculated in step (c) with a previously selected threshold; (e) for any block b for which the decision in step (d) is yes, adding the block b to the solid block B and merging the statistics of the block B with the statistics of the block b; and (f) for any block b for which the decision in step (d) is no, considering the current solid block B formed and using the rejected block as the starting block of the next solid block to be formed.