On: Zstandard – Real-time data compression algorithm

[vog]

Nice hack, I like it!

Small proposal for improvement: Instead of

    N * "gzip -9"  +  (100-N) * "cat"

I would have used

    N * "gzip -9"  +  (100-N) * "gzip -1"

because "gzip -1" is really, really fast. Sometimes I use it just to speed up copying data (over fast network or onto large disks).

(Yes, I'm aware that zlib's output is slightly different from gzip's output, as gzip adds some more metadata on top of zlib, but this is irrelevant in terms of size and speed.)

[adrianmonk → vog]

My small proposal for further improvement: change the -9 to a -7.

In my experience, -9 is considerably slower than -7 but the gains in compression ratio are negligible. It's almost never a good trade-off.

[stardomSerf → vog]

You would be surprised how much it is relevant in term of speed ....