[Lazarus] Cycle vs. Circle errors

[Hans-Peter Diettrich]

Howard Page-Clark schrieb:
> On 03/1/12 5:43, Mattias Gaertner wrote:
> 
>> The term "circle" was translated from German graph theory, but the
>> common words in English graph theory are "cycle" and "cyclic".
> 
> I'm not familiar with graph theory and the possibly specialist technical 
> meanings given there to words in common use.
> 
> However, in everyday English neither of the nouns 'cycle' or 'circle' 
> has the meaning 'mutual interdependence' except perhaps as a curious 
> extension of the metaphor which works poorly if at all.

After all I'm also not happy with "cycle", when a coder will use the 
term "loop" for cycles. But what's the according adjective - "loopy" 
looks a bit weird to me? ;-)

> Whereas the adjective 'circular' can carry a meaning of 'interdependent' 
> or 'dependent on itself'. So a 'circular argument' is flawed in that it 
> refers to itself rather than to an independently established 
> proposition. But in English you would not normally refer to such a 
> circular argument as a 'circle' and expect people (apart perhaps from 
> graph theorists?) to appreciate immediately what you meant.
> 
> Dependency (or interdependency) is the more descriptive term, which does 
> not rely on a strained metaphor - although 'mutual dependency' is rather 
> a mouthful.

IMO "dependency" is a straight unidirectional relationship (A depends on 
B), but "interdependency" is not a common term in technical (simplified 
international) documentation. The same for "cycle", as borrowed from 
graph theory, which associates with "motor cycle" in technical context.

Many languages seem to have problems with loops/circles/cycles as nouns, 
and the matching adjectives. Which noun and adjective would you suggest 
in the context of code and (circular) unit references?

DoDi