persistence

Plural: persistences

Noun

• the property of a continuous and connected period of time
• persistent determination
• the act of persisting or persevering; continuing or repeating behavior
• The property of being persistent.
• Of data, the property of continuing to exist after the termination of the program.
• Continuation of the previous day's weather (particularly temperature and precipitation statistics).
• The number of times an operation can be iteratively applied to a number before it reaches a permanently constant state.

Examples

• Once written to a disk file, the data has persistence: it will still be there tomorrow when we run the next program.
• The persistence of the number 39 under the operation of multiplying the digits of the number is three, because 3x9 = 27, 2x7 = 14, and 1x4 = 4, and no further iterations will change the number again.
• You've got to admire her persistence. She's asked him out every day for a month even though she keeps turning him down.

Synonyms

continuity, doggedness, perseverance, perseveration, persistency, pertinacity, tenaciousness, tenacity