Tony M Apr 11, 2017:

@ Donal I'l inclinded to agree with you, as I can't really see the mathematical justification here for using a 'complex' function like 'sum of squares' — as daryo says, a lot more context would probably help make things clearer; in particular, we might be able to assess if this is simply flawed non-native EN, which is about the only thing that could really explain this apparent 'error'. The fact it says "sum of square of" appears on the face of it to be an error, as almost any interpretation I can think of would require 'sum of' to be followed by a plural. Then again, one might reasonably expect 'the sum of...' rather than 'a', which is what in my mind gives the hint towards 'sum of squares', along with the following 'of'.

DLyons Apr 10, 2017:

My best guess is that this has nothing to do with a sum of squares. It seems more likely that it's some sort of measure of total unforested area i.e clear-cuts + roads.

Daryo Apr 6, 2017:

Far more context is needed! "square(s)" COULD well be "pixels" on a digitalised map, for all we know so far!!!

i.e. "just count the small 'squares' representing cuts and roads" - COULD be what they are talking about.

Marie 07 (asker) Apr 6, 2017:

Thank you Tony!

Tony M Apr 6, 2017:

@ Asker I suspect it probably would be, but as I am a native speaker of EN, not FR, and I am also no mathematician, I can't personally answer that question. However, it should be very simple for you to research, just by Googling your suggested term and seeing if you get a meaningful number of relevant hits, which would be the first step, at least.

Marie 07 (asker) Apr 6, 2017:

Thank you for you help, and sorry for posting two different terms here.
I'm sorry, I'm not familiar with this statistical concept.
Is it "somme des carrés" in French ?

Tony M Apr 6, 2017:

KudoZ rule 2.3 KudoZ rule 2.3 allows only a single term per question. Your second term 'cuts' should be posted as a separate question.

Tony M Apr 6, 2017:

@ Asker No, your proposed translation is NOT correct, as you have overlooked one key part of the phrase: it is not just "the sum of square cuts..." as if round cuts didn't count. The text is actually "sum of square of cuts ..." — this is the mathematical concept of the 'sum of squares', which in certain statistical fields gives a more meaningful criterion. In certain technical fields, the squares of certain figures may be summed and then the square root of the result taken, leading to the notion of Root Mean Square' (rms), which is one way of removing the negative sign of things like an electrical waveform that can have both poisitive and negative polarity.