To be fair, the original paper does mention the problem of whitespaces (see Appendix B on page 21). It seems that the recommended solution is to use this fast s

To be fair, the original paper does mention the problem of whitespaces (see Appendix B on page 21). It seems that the recommended solution is to use this fast space remover: https://github.com/lemire/despacer https://github.com/lemire/despacer