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Research and Advances

Computer programs for detecting and correcting spelling errors

With the increase in word and text processing computer systems, programs which check and correct spelling will become more and more common. Peterson investigates the basic structure of several such existing programs and their approaches to solving the problems which arise when this type of program is created. The basic framework and background necessary to write a spelling checker or corrector are provided.
Research and Advances

The selection of optimal tab settings

A new generation of computer terminals allows tab settings to be selected and set by the computer. This feature can be used to reduce the number of characters that are needed to represent a document for transmission and printing. In this note, an algorithm is given for selecting the optimal set of tab stops for minimizing the number of characters transmitted. An implementation of the algorithm has reduced the number of characters transmitted by from 7 to 30 percent, but requires a prepass through the document to compute a matrix used in determining the optimal set of tab stops. The use of fixed tab stops, as a heuristic alternative, can achieve about 80 percent of optimal with no prepass.
Research and Advances

Buddy systems

Two algorithms are presented for implementing any of a class of buddy systems for dynamic storage allocation. Each buddy system corresponds to a set of recurrence relations which relate the block sizes provided to each other. Analyses of the internal fragmentation of the binary buddy system, the Fibonacci buddy system, and the weighted buddy system are given. Comparative simulation results are also presented for internal, external, and total fragmentation.
Research and Advances

A weighted buddy method for dynamic storage allocation

An extension of the buddy method, called the weighted buddy method, for dynamic storage allocation is presented. The weighted buddy method allows block sizes of 2k and 3·2k, whereas the original buddy method allowed only block sizes of 2k. This extension is achieved at an additional cost of only two bits per block. Simulation results are presented which compare this method with the buddy method. These results indicate that, for a uniform request distribution, the buddy system has less total memory fragmentation than the weighted buddy algorithm. However, the total fragmentation is smaller for the weighted buddy method when the requests are for exponentially distributed block sizes.

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