# Explanation of Jitter component

Would someone be kind enough to explain a little bit what the jitter component does to a set and how it enacts that transformation? This could be a really valuable tool in the future and I’d like to better understand it. Thanks!

It changes the order of the items in a list. The ‘distance’ each item is allowed to move is controlled via the strength parameter.

Original list \hspace{2.5mm} = \{a,b,c,d,e,f,g,h,i,j,k\}
Weak jitter \hspace{3.5mm} = \{a,c,b,d,f,e,g,h,i,k,j\}
Medium jitter \hspace{0mm} = \{c,a,e,b,f,i,d,h,j,g,k\}
Strong jitter \hspace{2.2mm} = \{h,c,k,f,a,b,j,g,e,i,d\}

The process behind jitter relies on creating a list of random numbers, which are then used as sorting keys while the original values are sorted synchronously. So, working with a shorter list \{a,b,c,d\}, another, equally long, list of numeric domains is generated \{(0-r, 0+r), (1-r, 1+r), (2-r, 2+r), (3-r, 3+r) \}, where r is the jitter strength multiplied by the list length. Then, from within each numeric domain a random value is picked. So if for example r=1, then the numeric domains are \{(-1, 1), (0,2), (1, 3), (2, 4)\} sorting keys might be \{-0.3, 1.5, 1.3, 3.9\}, which would result in the swapping of b and c, because 1.5 is bigger than 1.3.

David,

Thanks for the explanation. This is very helpful. One last question about the Jitter component:

A. Are the random sorting keys applied uniformly to the entire series (ie each item is impacted individually by the same random strength)? Essentially, is the entire deck of cards getting shuffled uniformly or is it

B. There is a change in strength of the random modifier applied between the start and end of a series. For example, in the following series = { a, b, c, d, e } the modifier works from one end and dissipates towards the other (ie: { a, b, d, e, c }?

Much appreciated

I generate a random value in a fixed size domain. So the ‘strength’ varies smoothly between the minimum and maximum.