permutation

per·mu·ta·tion

any radical alteration; total transformation
1. a complete rearrangement, esp. by interchanging
2. Math. any of the total number of groupings, or subsets, into which a group, or set, of elements can be arranged in a particular order: the permutations of A, B, and C taken two at a time are AB, BA, AC, CA, BC, CB

Origin of permutation

Middle English permutacion from Middle French from Classical Latin permutatio from permutare: see permute

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"permutation." YourDictionary, n.d. Web. 22 March 2019. <https://www.yourdictionary.com/permutation>.

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permutation. (n.d.). Retrieved March 22nd, 2019, from https://www.yourdictionary.com/permutation

permutation

noun

a. The process of altering the order of a given set of objects in a group.
b. The result of such a process; a rearrangement or recombination of elements: permutations of gene order.
c. Mathematics A rearrangement of the elements of a set.
A complete change; a transformation: the country's permutation into a modern democracy.

Related Forms:

per′mu·ta′tion·al
adjective

THE AMERICAN HERITAGE® DICTIONARY OF THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE, FIFTH EDITION by the Editors of the American Heritage Dictionaries. Copyright © 2016, 2011 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

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MLA Style

"permutation." YourDictionary, n.d. Web. 22 March 2019. <https://www.yourdictionary.com/permutation>.

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permutation. (n.d.). Retrieved March 22nd, 2019, from https://www.yourdictionary.com/permutation

Noun

(plural permutations)

(mathematics) A one-to-one mapping from a finite set to itself.
This permutation takes each element to the one following it, with the last mapped back to the first.
(mathematics, combinatorics) An ordering of a finite set of distinct elements.
There are six permutations of three elements, e.g. {abc, acb, bac, bca, cab, cba}.
(music) A transformation of a set's prime form, by applying one or more of certain operations, specifically, transposition, inversion, and retrograde.

Origin

From Old French permutacion (French: permutation).

English Wiktionary. Available under CC-BY-SA license.

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Link to this page

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MLA Style

"permutation." YourDictionary, n.d. Web. 22 March 2019. <https://www.yourdictionary.com/permutation>.

APA Style

permutation. (n.d.). Retrieved March 22nd, 2019, from https://www.yourdictionary.com/permutation

permutation - Computer Definition

One possible combination of items out of a larger set of items. For example, with the set of numbers 1, 2 and 3, there are six possible permutations: 12, 21, 13, 31, 23 and 32.

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