In mathematics, a matrix (plural matrices) is a rectangular array of numbers, symbols, or expressions, arranged in rows and columns. The individual items in a matrix are called its elements or entries.
In mathematics, a matrix (plural matrices) is a rectangular array of numbers, symbols, or expressions, arranged in rows and columns. The individual items in a matrix are called its elements or entries.
Matrices with the same number of rows and columns can be added or subtracted element by element. But the rule for matrix multiplication is that two matrices can be multiplied only when the number of columns in the first equals the number of rows in the second.
Types of matrices
- Square matrix (Same number of rows and columns)
- Row matrix (Contains only one row)
- Column matrix (Contains only one column)
- Diagonal or Triangular matrix
- Identity matrix
- Upper Triangular matrix
- Lower Triangular matrix
- Block matrix
- Sparse matrix
- Test matrices (Cauchy, Jordan block, etc)
- Special matrices such as: Hadamard, Hankel, Hilbert, Pascal, Toeplitz, Vandermonde, etc.
A matrix can be represented as a 2-d (two dimensional) array in any programming language, where one of the two dimensions defines row elements of a matrix, and other dimension defines column elements of the matrix.
Tag usage
The tag matrix can contain programming related problems in implementing matrices. Questions in this tag will be related to a multidimensional array, so these questions can also be tagged with array. Please avoid mathematical problems on stackoverflow (use the Mathematics Stack Exchange site instead).
Also note these related tags:
- matrix-multiplication for the linear algebra problem
- sparse-matrix for matrices with mostly zeroes
- adjacency-matrix for the connections in graphs
