A DELTA array is compressed by storing only the differences between adjacent array values along a nominated compression axis, rather than the full array values. The differences are stored using a smaller data type than the original absolute values. The compression is lossless because any differences that will not fit into the smaller data type are stored explicitly in an extra array with a larger data type. Additional compression is achieved by replacing runs of equal values by a single value and a repeat count.
NDF [1ex