Binary trees are useful data structures for encoding and decoding information. The Huffman algorithm generates optimal binary trees for this purpose and can do so efficiently. Binary search trees are useful data structures for storing information that is to be searched; they also produce good codes.
Greedy binary search trees, which are nearly optimal, can be generated very efficiently. The greedy method of algorithm design does not yield optimal solutions but may still yield very good solutions. Again it was demonstrated that careful selection of data structures can significantly change the time requirements of an algorithm.