I am reading Amann and Escher's trilogy on Analysis and at the very beginning of volume II, the authors begin with the definition of a step functions and what it means for a step function to be "jump continuous". Intuitively, I know what this means but the authors use very unfamiliar notation at this point. Specifically, they use f(a+0) to denote the limit of f as x approaches a from the right (at least, this is what I think they mean by it) I have rewritten the definition as I understand it using notation that is more familiar and it reads:
A function f:I→E from the perfect interval I to the Banach space (E,||⋅||) is called a step function if I has a partition P=(α0,…,αn) such that f is constant on every open interval (αj−1,…αj)
Moreover, if the limits limx→α+f(x) and limx→β−f(x) exist and the limits
limx→a−f(x) and limx→a+f(x) exist for each a in the interior of I then f is said to be
jump continuous
Can anyone comment on the correctness of the above definition and verify that I have interpreted the authors' meaning correctly?
Answer
There isn't much more to say to answer this question, except to confirm that you understood the definition correctly. I also find the notation f(a+0) for the limit from one side of a of the function f quite strange.
Step functions are fundamental for various reasons; among the most elementary is that they are typically used in the development of the Lebesgue integral, although they (well, their `derivatives') are also typically used to motivate the theory of distributions and generalised functions.
Perhaps one can also store a link to the Wikipedia page here.
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