permutation

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition

1. n. A complete change; a transformation.
2. n. The act of altering a given set of objects in a group.
3. n. Mathematics A rearrangement of the elements of a set.

Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia

1. n. Interchange; concurrent changes; mutual change; change in general.
2. n. Exchange; barter.
3. n. In mathematics, a linear arrangement of objects resulting from a change of their order. Permutation differs from combination in this, that in the latter there is no reference to the order in which the quantities are combined, whereas in the former this order is considered, and consequently the number of permutations always exceeds the number of combinations.If n represents the number of quantities, then the number of permutations that can be formed out of them, taking two by two together, is n X (n-1); taken three and three together, it is n X (n-1) X (n-2); and so on. Sometimes called alternation. See combination, 5.
4. n. In philology, the mutation or interchange of consonants, especially of allied consonants.

Wiktionary

1. n. A one-to-one mapping from a finite set to itself.
2. n. An ordering of a finite set of distinct elements.
3. n. A transformation of a set's prime form, by applying one or more of certain operations, specifically, transposition, inversion, and retrograde.

GNU Webster's 1913

1. n. The act of permuting; exchange of the thing for another; mutual transference; interchange.
2. n. The arrangement of any determinate number of things, as units, objects, letters, etc., in all possible orders, one after the other; -- called also alternation. Cf. Combination, n., 4.
3. n. Any one of such possible arrangements.
4. n. Barter; exchange.

WordNet 3.0

1. n. the act of changing the arrangement of a given number of elements
2. n. act of changing the lineal order of objects in a group
3. n. an event in which one thing is substituted for another
4. n. complete change in character or condition