12 years of Python and only at v2.2
Erik Max Francis
max at alcyone.com
Thu Dec 5 16:30:43 EST 2002
Dennis Lee Bieber wrote:
> "Monotonic" is, itself, a hard term to pin down... Out of
> three
> dictionaries in my possession, only the OED had any definitions that
> were not tied to the literal "single tone". [I would like to state
> that
> one of the other two dictionaries is a 4" thick unabridged, not the
> more common "college" editions]
That's because it's a mathematical term, and like most technical terms,
general dictionaries -- even very good ones -- are usually not the best
way to find their definitions.
I'd recomend something like MathWorld as a reference for such terms:
http://mathworld.wolfram.com/MonotonicSequence.html
http://mathworld.wolfram.com/MonotonicFunction.html
If something is monotonic, it just means that it either forever
increases or forever decreases. It doesn't even mean that it does so
without bound; a sequence can be monotic but approach a finite value.
--
Erik Max Francis / max at alcyone.com / http://www.alcyone.com/max/
__ San Jose, CA, USA / 37 20 N 121 53 W / &tSftDotIotE
/ \ I get my kicks above the wasteline, sunshine
\__/ The American, _Chess_
Alcyone Systems / http://www.alcyone.com/
Alcyone Systems, San Jose, California.
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