different between parameter vs category

English

Alternative forms

• parametre

Etymology

From French paramètre, from New Latin parametrum (“parameter”), from Ancient Greek ???? (pará, “beside”) + ?????? (métron, “measure”).

Pronunciation

• (UK) IPA^(key): /p???æm.?.t?/

Noun

parameter (plural parameters)

1. A value kept constant during an experiment, equation, calculation or similar, but varied over other versions of the experiment, equation, calculation, etc.
2. (sciences) a variable that describes some system (material, object, event etc.) or some aspect thereof
   • 2007, Charles M. Hansen, Hansen Solubility Parameters: A User's Handbook, Second Edition, CRC Press ?ISBN, page 113

     Cohesion parameters (solubility parameters) can be used with full theoretical justification to characterize many surfaces ...

   • 2012, Wolfgang Desch, Franz Kappel, Karl Kunisch, Control and Estimation of Distributed Parameter Systems: International Conference in Maria Trost (Austria), July 15–21, 2001, Birkhäuser ?ISBN, page 41

     To this end, we derive an a posteriori error estimator for the error with respect to the unknown parameter.

   • 2012, Michael Lemmon, Competitively Inhibited Neural Networks for Adaptive Parameter Estimation, Springer Science & Business Media ?ISBN, page 74

     The parameter estimation problem considered in this chapter consists of estimating the unknown parameter, ? [a barred v, actually], given N samples of the observation process.

3. (programming) An input variable of a procedure definition, that gets an actual value (argument) at execution time (formal parameter).

   Roughly, a tuple of arguments could be thought of as a vector, whereas a tuple of parameters could be thought of as a covector (i.e., linear functional). When a function is called, a parameter tuple becomes "bound" to an argument tuple, allowing the function instance itself to be computed to yield a return value. This would be roughly analogous to applying a covector to a vector (by taking their dot product (or, rather, matrix-product of row vector and column vector)) to obtain a scalar.

4. (programming) An actual value given to such a formal parameter (argument or actual parameter).
5. A characteristic or feature that distinguishes something from others.
6. (geometry) In the ellipse and hyperbola, a third proportional to any diameter and its conjugate, or in the parabola, to any abscissa and the corresponding ordinate.

   The parameter of the principal axis of a conic section is called the latus rectum.

7. (crystallography) The ratio of the three crystallographic axes which determines the position of any plane.
8. (crystallography) The fundamental axial ratio for a given species.

Usage notes

• (the value used to instantiate the name): Some authors regard use of parameter to mean argument as imprecise, preferring that parameter refers only to the name that will be instantiated, and argument to refer to the value that will be supplied to it at runtime.

Synonyms

• (value passed to a function): argument
• (characteristic distinguishing something from others): distinguishing feature
• See also Thesaurus:characteristic

Derived terms

• actual parameter
• formal parameter

Related terms

• parametric
• parametrise, parametrize

Translations

See also

• variable

Further reading

• parameter in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, G. & C. Merriam, 1913.
• parameter in The Century Dictionary, New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911.

Dutch

Etymology

Borrowed from Latin parameter.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /pa??ra?m?t?r/, /?pa?ra??me?t?r/, /pa??ra??me?t?r/
• Hyphenation: pa?ra?me?ter

Noun

parameter m (plural parameters, diminutive parametertje n)

1. a parameter

Derived terms

• parametervoorstelling
• parametrisch

Norwegian Bokmål

Etymology

From para- +? meter

Noun

parameter m (definite singular parameteren, indefinite plural parametere or parametre or parametrer, definite plural parameterne or parametrene)

1. a parameter

References

• “parameter” in The Bokmål Dictionary.

Norwegian Nynorsk

Etymology

From para- +? meter

Noun

parameter m (definite singular parameteren, indefinite plural parameterar or parametrar, definite plural parameterane or parametrane)

1. a parameter

References

• “parameter” in The Nynorsk Dictionary.

Swedish

Noun

parameter c

1. a parameter

Declension

For information about Wiktionary categories, see Wiktionary:Categorization.

English

Etymology

Late Middle English, borrowed from French catégorie, from Middle French categorie, from Late Latin cat?goria (“class of predicables”), from Ancient Greek ????????? (kat?goría, “head of predicables”). Doublet of categoria.

Pronunciation

• (General American, Canada) IPA^(key): /?kæt?????i/
• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /?kæt??(?)?i/
• (General New Zealand) IPA^(key): /?k?t??(?)?i/, /?k?t???o??i/
• Hyphenation: cat?e?go?ry, cat?e?gory

Noun

category (plural categories)

1. A group, often named or numbered, to which items are assigned based on similarity or defined criteria.

   • The traditional way of describing the similarities and differences between constituents is to say that they belong to categories of various types. Thus, words like boy, girl, man, woman, etc. are traditionally said to belong to the category of Nouns, whereas words like a, the, this, and that are traditionally said to belong to the category of Determiners.

2. (mathematics) A collection of objects, together with a transitively closed collection of composable arrows between them, such that every object has an identity arrow, and such that arrow composition is associative.

Synonyms

• (group to which items are assigned): class, family, genus, group, kingdom, order, phylum, race, tribe, type
• See also Thesaurus:class

Hyponyms

Derived terms

Related terms

Translations

Further reading

• category in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, G. & C. Merriam, 1913.
• category in The Century Dictionary, New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911.