A is a set of real numbers. Really confused as to what this line does. The numerator looks like its taking the subset of A that does not contain the smallest value. The denominator appears to be the range. How can you divide the resulting subset by the range? Or perhaps that is not what the numerator is doing?
A <- (A - min(A)) * (max(A) - min(A))^-1
^-1 means take the matrix inverse not the reciprocal
Assuming A is an matrix of real numbers, then the expression can be broken down as follows:
let mna = min(A) : Scalar - the minimum value of A
let mxa = max(A) : Scalar - the maximum value of A
let N = (A-min(A)) = Array - Scalar - each element of A minus mna
let X = (A-max(A)) ... minus mxa
so we have N*inverse(X)
... Which would be true if I had put my glasses on and read the expression properly instead of as A <- (A - min(A)) * (A - max(A))^-1
However, as the expression is actually A <- (A - min(A)) * (max(A) - min(A))^-1, the explanation is different.
The expression for N is the same (although I note parenthetically that an expression of the form (array - scalar/conformable-array) means subtract; it is not an array element deletion operation).
However, (max(A) - min(A)) is what it looks like, the maximum value of A minus it's minimum value, and the ^-1 in this instance does mean divide.
The expression therefore returns A with all values scaled to lie between 0 (==min(A)) and 1 (==max(A)).
The <- at the start of the expression is Mathcad's local definition operator (used to assign values in a Mathcad "program") and simply assigns the normalized value of A back to A.
