1Forces
1.1 Terminology and Notation
A force exerted on a body tends to change the state of the body, that is, if the body is rigid the force tends to move the body, but when the body is elasto-plastic the force tends to deform the body.
A force can be defined as a vector quantity that is defined by magnitude and direction. The direction of a force is specified by its orientation (also known as the line of action) and sense. The magnitude of a force is a positive scalar. A scalar is a number expressed in specific units of measure.
Vectors (forces) are usually denoted by boldface letters. If the starting point 
and the end point 
of a vector (force) are given, the vector (force) could be denoted by 
or more simply 
. It is also usual to denote the magnitude of the vector (force) by 
or by 
. Some other notations for vectorial quantities could be , , or .
Graphically a force is represented ...
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