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What is the difference between category and prototype?

category | prototype |

As nouns the difference between category and prototype

is that category is a group, often named or numbered, to which items are assigned based on similarity or defined criteria while prototype is an original object or form which is a basis for other objects, forms, or for its models and generalizations.

As a verb prototype is

to create a prototype of.

category

Noun

(categories)
  • A group, often named or numbered, to which items are assigned based on similarity or defined criteria.
  • *
  • The traditional way of describing the similarities and differences between constituents is to say that they belong to categories'' of various types. Thus, words like ''boy'', ''girl'', ''man'', ''woman'', etc. are traditionally said to belong to the category''' of Nouns, whereas words like ''a'', ''the'', ''this'', and ''that'' are traditionally said to belong to the ' category of Determiners.
    This steep and dangerous climb belongs to the most difficult category .
    I wouldn't put this book in the same category as the author's first novel.
  • (mathematics) A collection of objects, together with a transitively closed collection of composable arrows between them, such that every object has an identity arrow, and such that arrow composition is associative.
  • One well-known category has sets as objects and functions as arrows.
    Just as a monoid consists of an underlying set with a binary operation "on top of it" which is closed, associative and with an identity, a category consists of an underlying digraph with an arrow composition operation "on top of it" which is transitively closed, associative, and with an identity at each object. In fact, a category's composition operation, when restricted to a single one of its objects, turns that object's set of arrows (which would all be loops) into a monoid.

    Synonyms

    * (group to which items are assigned) class, family, genus, group, kingdom, order, phylum, race, tribe, type * See also

    Derived terms

    * category mistake * category theory * conceptual category * perceptual category * subcategory * supercategory

    prototype

    Noun

    (en noun)
  • An original object or form which is a basis for other objects, forms, or for its models and generalizations
  • An early sample or model built to test a concept or process
  • The prototype had loose wires and rough edges, but it worked.
  • (semantics) An instance of a category or a concept that combines its most representative attributes.
  • A robin is a prototype of a bird; a penguin is not.
  • (computing) A declaration of a function that specifies the name, return type, and parameters but none of the body, or actual code.
  • Synonyms

    * See also

    Derived terms

    * prototype theory

    Verb

    (prototyp)
  • To create a prototype of.