Constrained piecewise linear approximation of digital curves

We have considered a problem of continuous piecewise linear approximation of the digital curves with a minimum number of the line segments. Fast sub-optimal algorithm for constrained piecewise linear approximation is suggested to construct continuous piecewise linear representation of the input curve for a given error bound. The proposed fast sub-optimal algorithm can be used in combination with reduced-search dynamic programming algorithm to get a practically optimal solution in a few iterations. The proposed algorithms have demonstrated both high efficiency and time performance.