The Sparse matrix reference article from the English Wikipedia on 24-Apr-2004 (provided by Fixed Reference: snapshots of Wikipedia from wikipedia.org)

Sparse matrix

A sparse matrix is a matrix populated primarily with zeros, having very few nonzero elements.

This property is especially interesting when computer programs are used to solve mathematical problems involving matrices. If the matrices are large and sparse, storing all those zeroes may require much memory. Special data structures storing only the nonzero elements of sparse matrices have thus been developed to reduce the memory needs. Special algorithms implement matrix operations on matrices stored in this way.

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