It is interesting is any mathematical term for the integer number for which factorial is evaluated?
That is n! is called factorial and is written as factorial( n ). And what is the name of n? Is any common acceptable term for n?
The questian arised when I wanted to name a function that returns n for a given value of factorial( n ).
Its most basic occurrence is the fact that there are n! ways to arrange n distinct objects into a sequence (i.e., permutations of the set of objects).
I guess this is combination of what iHutch105 and I are saying.
You could have a set of permutations from a set of objects.
This all talks about factorial n, as for n itself, it would just be number of objects in the set.
The other thing is what application is the factorial for? Eg Terms in a series, but the factorial function is a general one (independent of the application), so I guess you could call it whatever you want.
Perhaps another way of looking at it, is that n is one of the set of positive whole numbers.
Is gamma a common acceptable term for integer number for which a factorial is evaluated?
Then how to name the maximum integer number for a given C/C++ integer type for which a factorial can be evaluated?
But is there the term base factorial numbers in mathematics?
Well the wiki page didn't have anything at all about what n was referred to as. Does that mean there isn't a term for n?
Will it confuse a user?
Could you come up with a sentence to describe it like : "Calculate the factorial for this number" You could put that on your form if it is a GUI app, and put it in a tooltip, or say whatever you want if it is a console app.
I guess you have to be careful with the psychology of users, but I wonder if there is some point where you have to assume some reasonable inteligence.
-- is any mathematical term for the integer number for which factorial is evaluated?
-- Don't know specific for the factorial. Generalizing, it's a function so its argument might be called argument.
-- I wanted to name a function that returns n for a given value of factorial( n ).
-- So you created the inverse function of the factorial. You may call it inverse_factorial
wikipedia wrote:
In mathematics, the gamma function (represented by the capital Greek letter Γ) is an extension of the factorial function,