A useful type of hologram, the Fraunhofer-Fresnel hologram (FFH), is p
roposed and studied. Its potential for lensless optical information pr
ocessing, multifacet holographic storage and programmable interconnect
ion is experimentally demonstrated. Compared with previous methods, su
ch as the conventional Fourier hologram and the newly suggested pinhol
e hologram, the FFH has special advantages: high resolution, better re
cording linearity, easy to house additional elements, and the simplest
optical arrangement.