1.
mathematics A single number, as opposed to a
vector or
matrix of numbers. Thus, for example, "scalar
multiplication" refers to the operation of multiplying one
number (one scalar) by another and is used to contrast this
with "matrix multiplication" etc.
operations - those which cannot be parallelised or vectorised.
3. programming Any data type that stores a single value
data type that has many elements. A
string is regarded as a
scalar in some languages (e.g.
Perl) and a vector of
(2002-06-12)