Distribution facts for kids

The word distribution has several meanings:

Mathematics

• In mathematics a distribution is a generalization of a function to be able to model certain systems, inspired by physics, see distribution (mathematics).

Probability theory and statistics

• In Probability theory, it refers to the way a certain number of samples can be assigned to different categories, see Frequency distribution.
• In Statistics, it refers to the probability that a random variable has a certain value, or falls inside a given interval, see Probability distribution. This is the theoretical counterpart behind frequency distributions.

Economics

• In Economics, it talks about getting a product from the producer to the client. See distribution (economics).

Computer science

• In Computer science, it may refer to the practice of allocating a number of tasks to different machines, scattered over a network. See distributed computing.

Computing

• With Software, a distribution is something that puts different applications in the same package. See Linux distribution for an example.

Biology

• The study of the distribution of living things on the Earth is called biogeography.

Power system

• In power system, the process of delivering electricity to customer is called Electric power distribution.