from
The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48
Anneal \An*neal"\, v. t. [imp. & p. p. {Annealed}; p. pr. & vb.
n. {Annealing}.] [OE. anelen to heat, burn, AS. an?lan; an on
+ ?lan to burn; also OE. anelen to enamel, prob. influenced
by OF. neeler, nieler, to put a black enamel on gold or
silver, F. nieller, fr. LL. nigellare to blacken, fr. L.
nigellus blackish, dim. of niger black. Cf. {Niello},
{Negro}.]
1. To subject to great heat, and then cool slowly, as glass,
cast iron, steel, or other metal, for the purpose of
rendering it less brittle; to temper; to toughen.
[1913 Webster]
2. To heat, as glass, tiles, or earthenware, in order to fix
the colors laid on them.
[1913 Webster]
from
The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48
Annealing \An*neal"ing\, n.
1. The process used to render glass, iron, etc., less
brittle, performed by allowing them to cool very gradually
from a high heat.
[1913 Webster]
2. The burning of metallic colors into glass, earthenware,
etc.
[1913 Webster]
from
The Free On-line Dictionary of Computing (8 July 2008)
simulated annealing
annealing
A technique which can be applied to any minimisation or
learning process based on successive update steps (either
random or {deterministic}) where the update step length is
proportional to an arbitrarily set parameter which can play
the role of a temperature. Then, in analogy with the
annealing of metals, the temperature is made high in the early
stages of the process for faster minimisation or learning,
then is reduced for greater stability.