On Components of Preparata Codes

The paper considers the interrelation between $i$-components of an arbitrary Preparata-like code $P$ and $i$-components of a perfect code $C$ containing $P$. It is shown that each i-component of $P$ can uniquely be completed to an $i$-component of $C$ by adding a certain number of special codewords of $C$. It is shown that the set of vertices of $P$ in a characteristic graph of an arbitrary $i$-component of $C$ forms a perfect code with distance 3.