Our first post explains that “cod” very likely stands for “coded” (image) but does not explain what “cis” means. TL;DR: It’s the acronym for Computer and Information Sciences, Inc., a company that was involved in the implementation of the Lightning Strike image codec.

Infinop, Inc. and Computer and Information Sciences, Inc.

The Lightning Strike image codec was distributed by a company named Infinop, Inc. and there are several links between that company and Computer and Information Sciences, Inc. I first stumbled over the latter name (that can be abbreviated as CIS, Inc.) in the publication Dissemination of compressed Satellite imagery within the Navy SPAWAR Central Site Product Display environment (archived tar.gz with all HTML documents from the host www.compsci.com) that was published on October 1, 1995, at The 1995 Science Information Management and Data Compression Workshop. Looking at the company’s archived web page we see a directory listing with two folders – infinop and lstrike that link CIS to Infinop and the Lightning Strike image codec. The windows subdirectory of the “infinop” directory contains the executables ls16tiny.exe, ls32tiny.exe, and lstplug.exe that contain 16 and 32 bit variants of the Lightning Strike web browser plugin in version 1.7, the file lsic25.zip that contains the Lightning Strike Image Compressor (LSIC) in version 2.5, as well as a directory with several exemplary CIS/COD images.

Another evidence for the relationship between the two companies are their addresses. The Infinop web page states the company’s address as 3401 East University #104, Denton, TX 76208. The above-mentioned publication states as the address of Compsci, Inc. 303 N. Carroll, Suite 108, Denton TX 76201. Both locations are roughly 5 miles apart in Denton, Texas..

Another link between the two companies is via the former homepage of Hongyang Chao, which was hosted on compsci.com and states that she is the designer of the Lightning Strike image compressor, linking to infinop.com.

Looking at other people, a press release states that “Craig Fisher” is “president of Infinop, Inc.” and the authors of the above-mentioned publication are “Oleg Kiselyov and Paul Fisher”, who also co-authored other image compression-related papers, for example, Image Compression with Iterated Function Systems, Finite Automata and Zerotrees: Grand Unification (submitted to arXiv on March 15, 2000). Oleg Kiselyov graduated as a PhD under supervision of Dr. Paul S. Fisher at the university of North Texas. We could speculate whether Paul (S.) Fisher and Craig Fisher might have been relatives.

Infinitron Research International, Inc.

There’s another company – Infinitron Research International, Inc. – that seems to have played a role in the codec. It is mentioned in the patent WO1998040842A1 that was published on September 17, 1998. The patent contains the paper An approach of fast integer reversible wavelet transform for image compression written by Hongyang Chao and Paul Fisher of “Computer and Information Science Inc.” [sic] located at 3401 East University #104, Denton, TX 76208. That is the address that Infinop, Inc. (!) gave on its web page and not the CSI, Inc. page from the other paper! The patent also contains a product flyer for the Lightning Strike Image Compressor (LSIC) version 3.0, distributed by Infinitron, Inc. – also located at 3401 East University #104, Denton, TX 76208. And, last but not least, the patent shows HTML source code to embed an image map that links to www.infinop.com.

Overview and Summary

documentdatepersonsaffiliationaddress
scholarly article Dissemination of compressed Satellite imagery within the Navy SPAWAR Central Site Product Display environment (archived tar.gz of HTML documents with full address) October 1, 1995 authors: Oleg Kiselyov, Paul Fisher Computer and Information Sciences, Inc. 303 N. Carroll, Suite 108, Denton TX 76201
first news entry on Infinop web page September 13, 1996 Infinop, Inc. 3401 East University #104, Denton, TX 76208
press release Lightning Strike 2.6 Plugin is Ready for the Web November 7, 1996 president: Craig Fisher Infinop, Inc. 3401 East University #104, Denton, TX 76208
scholarly article An Approach to Fast Integer Reversible Wavelet Transforms for Image Compression citing papers state varying dates between September 1996 and May 1997, the homepage of Hongyang Chao states "AUG. 11-15, 1997" as the date of the symposium where the article was presented authors: Hongyang Chao, Paul Fisher Computer and Information Science Inc. 3401 E. University, Suite 104. Denton, TX 76208
Infinitron Product Fact Sheet for the Lightning Strike Image Compressor (LSIC) version 3.0 (PDF of the patent that contains it) March 1997 Infinitron Research International, Inc. 3401 East University, #104, Denton, TX.76208
patent WO1998040842A1 1998-03-11: application filed, 1998-09-17: published inventors: Hongyang Chao, Zeyi Hua, Howard P. Fischer, Paul S. Fischer COMPUTER INFORMATION AND SCIENCES, INC. Suite 104, 3401 East University, Denton, TX 76208

Given the many clues it seems evident that Infinop, Inc., Infinitron Research International, Inc., and Computer and Information Sciences, Inc. were all related to the Lightning Strike image compression technology and were likely founded or run by the same (group of) people.