QuantEcon / QuantEcon/lecture-python-advanced.myst

calvo.md and calvo_machine_learn.md: $L^2$ definition removed but notation still used

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Description

Summary

PR #312 ("[amss] Update Tom's edits to AMSS and Calvo Lectures") removed the local definition of square-summable / $L^2$ from the three Calvo lectures, but several places still use the $L^2$ notation without a definition, leaving readers without context for what space is being referenced.

Locations still using L^2 after the definition was removed

lectures/calvo.md — 7 occurrences
Line Context
330 $\vec \mu =\{\mu_t\}_{t=0}^\infty \in L^2$ into an inflation sequence
331 $\vec \theta = \{\theta_t\}_{t=0}^\infty \in L^2$.
334 $\vec v = \{v_t\}_{t=0}^\infty \in L^2$ that satisfies
340 sequence $\vec \mu \in L^2$.
342 At this point $\vec \mu \in L^2$ is an arbitrary exogenous policy.
453 $\{x_{t+1}, \mu_t \}_{t=0}^\infty$ sequences, with each sequence belonging to $L^2$:
460 where we require that $\{x_{t+1}, \mu_t \}_{t=0}^\infty \in L^2 \times L^2 .$
lectures/calvo_machine_learn.md — 1 occurrence
Line Context
208 \vec \theta \in L^2
lectures/calvo_abreu.md — clean

calvo_abreu.md had the same definition removed and no remaining $L^2$ references, so it's consistent.

Why it matters

Earlier in each affected lecture, the assumption on $\vec\mu$ was weakened from "square-summable" to "bounded" (a reasonable simplification — the discounted geometric structure of the forward solution is well-defined under boundedness). But the later sections that still use $L^2$ now reference an undefined space. A reader going top-to-bottom encounters $\vec\mu \in L^2$ at line 330+ in calvo.md with no prior definition or external pointer.

Suggested fix

Either:

  1. Reintroduce a brief $L^2$ definition in each of the two affected lectures (could be a one-liner: "$L^2$ denotes the space of square-summable sequences"), or
  2. Replace the remaining $L^2$ references with the weaker "bounded" framing if that's now the intended assumption end-to-end, or
  3. Cross-link to a single canonical definition in one of these lectures and have the others reference it.

Context

Surfaced by GitHub Copilot's PR review during sync of these lectures into lecture-dp (QuantEcon/lecture-dp#11). The PR is byte-identical to this repo's current main, so this issue belongs upstream.

🤖 Generated with Claude Code

Contributor guide

No contributing guide indexed for this repository

First steps

  1. Read the whole issue, then the project's contributing guide.
  2. Comment on the issue to say you are picking it up — it saves two people doing the same work.
  3. Fork the repository and make your change on a branch.
  4. Open a pull request that references the issue number.

Research direction

Start with the affected sections in lectures/calvo.md and lectures/calvo_machine_learn.md, then review PR #312 to understand why the L^2 definition was removed. Decide whether the intended assumption is a restored definition, bounded sequences, or a cross-link, and apply that choice to all listed occurrences. Check the rendered lecture text to confirm no undefined L^2 references remain.

Written by the indexing model from the issue text.

Assessment

Tech stack
latex, markdown
Domain
documentation
Issue type
Documentation
Difficulty
3/5
Estimated time
1-2 days
Activity status
Quiet
Clarity
Mostly clear
Newbie friendliness
68/100

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