nLab
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Welcome!

This is a wiki-lab for collaborative work on Mathematics, Physics and Philosophy — especially from the n-point of view: insofar as these subjects are usefully treated with tools and notions of category theory or higher category theory.

We think of this wiki as our lab book that we happen to keep lying around openly. We originally designed this place as as an adjunct to the $n$-Category Café, but it's more independent now.

The purpose of the $n$Lab is not to make polished expositions of material; that is a happy by-product. The purpose is to provide a public place where people can make notes about stuff.

We all make notes as we read papers, read books and doodle on pads of paper. The $n$Lab is somewhere to put all those notes, and, incidentally, to make them available to others. Others might read them and add or polish them. But even if they don’t, it is still easier to link from them to other notes that you’ve made.

This site started operation only a few months ago. Some structure is beginning to appear, but we are still in a very early stage. Your help is appreciated!

• See About for some ideas of what the $n$Lab is trying to be, and of what it is not.

• See the HowTo-page to get started if you want to contribute.

• See latest changes to get an idea of recent activity and to log your own changes to the $n$Lab.

• There is a forum (imaginatively called the $n$-Forum) for $n$Lab-related discussion.

  • at latest changes we log our latest activity on the $n$Lab

  • We also keep having constitutive discussions there. See for instance

    What is the scope of the nLab? Particularly original research?

    which is where the above description of the $n$lab as a lab book came from.

• Distilled wisdom from the various discussions is starting to appear on the FAQ.

Software requirements

The $n$Lab displays mathematical symbols using MathML. Some web-browsers, notably Firefox, know how to display this automatically, although you may need to install some fonts. For InternetExplorer one needs the MathPlayer plugin; download is quick and easy and free. For more see HowTo.

Notice that you don’t need to know any MathML. Only your browser does. You write formulas into the $n$Lab between dollar signs in iTeX, which is designed to be very similar to ordinary LaTeX.

The $n$Lab is a community undertaking. But for all matters that do require that the $n$Lab is represented to the outside by an official decision-taking body, we have the steering committee. Nobody “is in charge of the $n$Lab”. But the steering committee is the closest approximation to a body being in charge that we have.

category: meta