Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • noun The act or process of compressing.
  • noun The state of being compressed.
  • noun The process by which the working substance in a heat engine, such as the vapor mixture in the cylinder of an internal-combustion engine, is compressed.
  • noun The engine cycle during which this process occurs.
  • noun Computers The process by which data is compressed into a form that minimizes the space required to store or transmit it.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun The act of compressing, or the state of being compressed; a condition of being pressed into increased density or closeness: used in both literal and figurative senses.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • noun The act of compressing, or state of being compressed.
  • noun (Computers) reduction of the space required for storage (of binary data) by an algorithm which converts the data to a smaller number of bits while preserving the information content. The act of compressing {3}.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun to increase in density; the act of compressing, or the state of being compressed; compaction
  • noun the cycle of an internal combustion engine during which the fuel and air mixture is compressed
  • noun computing the process by which data is compressed
  • noun music the electronic process by which any sound's gain is automatically controlled

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • noun encoding information while reducing the bandwidth or bits required
  • noun the process or result of becoming smaller or pressed together
  • noun applying pressure
  • noun an increase in the density of something

Etymologies

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