Codec (Compressor/Decompressor)

Typically, a codec is implemented through the combination of hardware and software solutions. The software provides the algorithm or technique on which the data or file is compressed/decompressed, whereas the hardware provides raw computation to process data and/or physically implement the algorithm.

Codecs are widely used in computing applications to compress and decompress digital data. For example, a network-based compressor/decompressor utility compresses and transmits data from one end, whereas the process is reversed (decompressed) at the other end to retrieve the data in its original form.