Attribute

Encyclopedia : A : AT : ATT : Attribute

An attribute in general and in philosophy is an abstraction of a characteristic of an entity or substance, i.e. an essential property, as opposed to a non-necessary (contingent) property, which is called a mode.

• In art an "attribute" is an object that identifies a figure; most commonly it refers to objects held by saints in religious paintings that indicate which saint is being represented.
• In social sciences, an attribute is a characteristic of a variable. Variable like gender would have two attributes: male and female.
• In database management and directory services, an attribute is a property inherent in an entity or associated with that entity for database purposes.
• In network management, an attribute is a property of a managed object that has a value.
• In SGML-based markup languages like HTML and XML, an attribute is a parameter of an element, as in an HTML element.
• Attribute is a statistic for a character in role-playing games.
• Attribute is the name of a board game.
• An attribute may also refer to a deity's aspect; see Negative theology.