NAME

       sq, unsq - squeeze or unsqueeze a sorted word list

SYNOPSIS

       sq < infile > outfile

       unsq < infile > outfile

DESCRIPTION

       sq compresses a sorted list of words (a dictionary).  For example:
              sort -u /usr/share/dict/words | sq | gzip -9 > words.sq.gz
       will compress dict by about a factor of 5.

       unsq uncompress the output of sq.  For example:
              gunzip < words.sq.gz | unsq | sort -f -o words
       will uncompress a dictionary compressed with sq.

       The squeezing is achieved by eliminating common prefixes, and replacing them with a single
       character which encodes the number of characters shared  with  the  preceding  word.   The
       prefix  size  is encoded as a single printable character: 0-9 represent 0-9, A-Z represent
       10-35, and a-z represent 36-61.

BUGS

       sq and unsq can only handle words of up to 256 characters.  The input must be sorted,  and
       duplicates must be suppressed.

AUTHOR

       Mike Wexler

SEE ALSO

       compress(1), sort(1).

                                              LOCAL                                         SQ(1)