Notational conventions

Notation Explanation

bold

  • Indicates GUI elements, such as button text or menu names.

  • Highlights text for added importance or to draw attention to it.

italics

Indicates the first occurrence of a new term, titles of documents or topics, and user-supplied or variable values.

monospace

Indicates code, commands, file paths, or other text that should be displayed in a fixed-width font to differentiate it from the surrounding text.

<item>

Indicates user-supplied or variable values in code, commands, file paths, or other text that should be displayed in a monospace font.

Can also refer to generic types. For example: List<felt252>

\(\text{string_in_math_notation}\)

A normal (non-italics) serif typeface indicates a fixed element or constant specified in mathematical notation.

…​

An ellipsis indicates that the preceding element can repeat multiple times.

[item, …​]

Square brackets indicate that the enclosed items are optional. Also can indicate a range of numbers, where the enclosed items are included. For example, in [0,100], 0 and 100 are part of the specified range.

(item1, item2)

Parentheses indicate a range of numbers, where the enclosed items are not included. For example, in (0,100), 0 and 100 are not part of the specified range.

item1 | item2

A vertical bar (|) indicates a choice between item1 and item2.

{item1, item2}

Curly brackets indicates a list or set of possible values.

/

A forward slash indicates a division operator or a path separator in URLs and file paths.