Szip uses a limited order Sort transform. This transformation is related to
the Burrows-Wheeler transformation used in blocksorting compression methods.
The difference is a fast, deterministic behaviour in time at some compression
loss. And you can easily do it in hardware. Licencees (including hardware licencees) are welcome.

As next step it uses a specific model for blocksorted files.

The last step is a fast (byte oriented) arithmetic coder. A GNU GPL version
of this coder is available at ftp://eiunix.tuwien.ac.at/pub/michael/arith/
Other licenses (including Hardware licenses) are available.

The next release will include a new (faster & smaller) binary format.
I may also include switches to improve compression.

further questions?
look at the webpage http://eiunix.tuwien.ac.at/~michael/szip/
contact              michael@eiunix.tuwien.ac.at
in case .at --> .@   michael@hpkloe01.lnf.infn.it