View source for User:Sintel/Conventions

I'm gonna put this here since I keep forgetting where I commented this originally.



== Math conventions ==

There are currently no real conventions for mathematical notation. Since a lot of math pages involve linear algebra, I propose the following:

: Open up any introductory linear algebra textbook. Follow the notation that is used there.

In practice this means:
* Matrices are uppercase Roman letters: <math>M</math>.
* Vectors (whether column or row) are usually lowercase Roman letters: <math>u</math>.
* When there is potential confusion with scalars, they can be made boldface: <math>\mathbf{u}</math>, or get an arrow: <math>\overrightarrow{u}</math>.
* Inner product can be notated: <math>u^\mathsf{T}v</math> or <math>\left\langle u,v \right\rangle</math>.
* The p-norm is: <math>\| u \|_p</math>, when no p is given, 2-norm is assumed.
* When writing a column vector inside text, just transpose it: <math>w =\begin{bmatrix}
w_1 & w_2 & w_3
\end{bmatrix}^{\mathsf{T}}</math>.

The wiki has Mathjax support, use it!

This also means getting rid of bra-ket notation, by the way. They are used to denote quantum states in complex Hilbert spaces. We are not doing quantum physics here so let's stop pretending.