Editing Measuring network throughput (section)

==Compression==

Some equipment can improve matters by compressing the data as it is sent. This is a feature of most analog [[modem]]s and of several popular [[operating system]]s. If the 64 k file can be shrunk by [[Data compression|compression]], the time taken to transmit can be reduced. This can be done invisibly to the user, so a highly compressible file may be transmitted considerably faster than expected. As this 'invisible' compression cannot easily be disabled, it therefore follows that when measuring throughput by using files and timing the time to transmit, one should use files that cannot be compressed. Typically, this is done using a file of random data, which becomes harder to compress the closer to truly random it is.

Assuming your data cannot be compressed, the 8.192 seconds to transmit a 64 kilobyte file over a 64 kilobit/s communications link is a theoretical minimum time which will not be achieved in practice. This is due to the effect of overheads which are used to format the data in an agreed manner so that both ends of a connection have a consistent view of the data.

There are at least two issues that aren't immediately obvious for transmitting compressed files:

# The throughput of the network itself isn't improved by compression. From the end-to-end (server to client) perspective compression does improve throughput. That's because information content for the same amount of transmission is increased through compression of files.
# Compressing files at the server and client takes more processor resources at both the ends. The server has to use its processor to compress the files, if they aren't already done. The client has to decompress the files upon receipt. This can be considered an expense (for the server and client) for the benefit of increased end to end throughput(although the throughput hasn't changed for the network itself.)<ref>Comer, D. E. (2008). Computer Networks and Internets 5th Edition</ref>