Iterations are repeating processes or sequences, either identical or similar. They occur in natural phenomena, mathematics, manufacturing, and science. Iteration is the cornerstone of repetition and forms the basis of experimentation.
An iteration is a step in a repeating process or a single step in a recurring sequence. In its first usage, iterations are a single complete step of a process that repeats itself, in its entirety, over and over again. This usage is common in natural phenomena and mathematics, basically any system in which sequences occur spontaneously. The second definition is broader and describes repetitive situations. For example, a production iteration can refer to all cars of a specific make and model made in a single year; the years before and after are separate iterations of the same processes.
The cornerstone of iteration is repetition. For a process to be iterative, it has to happen over and over again. This could just be a long series of single actions, or it could be an almost infinite sequence. In both cases, the repeating sequences must be identical or nearly the same; otherwise, they are simply related occurrences.
When iterations refer to a repeating process, they can describe everything that happens, without interaction or outside influence, every single time. An example of this form of iteration is the revolution of the planet. When the Earth rotates around the sun, the moon around the Earth and the Earth around its axis, everything happens automatically and without fail. While there was a time when this process wasn’t happening, and there will be a point where it will stop, the sequence is nearly infinite from a human perspective. Each of these events, like a complete rotation around the sun, is an iteration of a revolution.
The second definition is much broader in scope. In this case, iterations are any sequence that follows another sequence that it is similar to. This type of iteration is common in manufacturing, science, and other man-made situations. In manufacturing, an iteration is the creation of a product group that has been made before or will be made again. It doesn’t matter what the product is or whether each product version is exactly the same, it just has to be similar.
In the sciences, iteration forms the basis of experimentation. When an experiment is conducted and data is collected and interpreted, it is an iteration. The next step is to examine all the accumulated data and find out where methods can be improved or the experimental hypothesis modified to accommodate the new information. When the experiment is run again, using the first stage as a basis, this is the second iteration.
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