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Naming conventions
Mathematics has many conventions. Below are some of the more common ones. Many of the symbols have other conventional uses, but they may actually represent a constant or a specific function rather than a variable.


 * a, b, c, and d (sometimes extended to e and f) usually play similar roles or are made to represent parallel notions in a mathematical context. They often represent constants or coefficients, for example in a polynomial or an equation, which are not completely specified.
 * a0, a1, a2, ... play a similar role, when otherwise too many different letters would be needed.
 * f and g (sometimes h) commonly denote functions.
 * i, j, and k (sometimes l or h) are often used to denote varying integers or indices in an indexed family.
 * ai is often used to denote the i-th term of a sequence.
 * l and w are often used to represent the length and width of a figure.
 * m and n usually denote integers and usually play similar roles or are made to represent parallel notions in a mathematical context, such a pair of dimensions.
 * n commonly denotes a fixed integer like a count of objects or the degree of an equation.
 * p, q, and r usually play similar roles or are made to represent parallel notions in a mathematical context.
 * p and q often denote prime numbers or relatively prime numbers, or, in statistics, probabilities.
 * r often denotes a remainder or a modulus.
 * r, s, and t usually play similar roles or are made to represent parallel notions in a mathematical context.
 * u and v usually play similar roles or are made to represent parallel notions in a mathematical context, such as denoting a vertex (graph theory).
 * w, x, y, and z usually play similar roles or are made to represent parallel notions in a mathematical context, such as representing unknowns in an equation.
 * x, y and z usually denote the three Cartesian coordinates of a point in Euclidean geometry. By extension, they are used to name the corresponding axes.
 * z typically denotes a complex number, or, in statistics, a normal random variate.
 * $$\alpha$$, $$\beta$$, $$\gamma$$, $$\theta$$ and $$\phi$$ commonly denote angle measures.
 * $$\epsilon$$ usually represents an arbitrarily small positive number.
 * $$\epsilon$$ and $$\delta$$ commonly denote two small positives.
 * $$\lambda$$ is used for eigenvalues.
 * $$\sigma$$ often denotes a sum, or, in statistics, the standard deviation.