1. A method of compressing a data block comprising: storing respective fixed-size symbols for each of a plurality of words in the data block in a symbol portion of a compressed data block, each of the symbols providing information about a corresponding one of the words in the data block; storing in a data portion of the compressed data block one or more data segments, each of the data segments corresponding to a unique one of the symbols in the compressed data block and a unique one of the words in the data block; and storing in the data portion of the compressed data block one or more dictionary entries, at least one of the dictionary entries corresponding to multiple ones of the symbols.