Both terms in the graph norm are finite and nonnegative. Moreover, forces , hence ; conversely gives . This proves definiteness of a norm.
The linearity of and absolute homogeneity of a norm give, for each real ,
Applying the triangle inequality in both normed spaces gives
Thus
Uniform expectations require nonempty finite sets; assume this throughout the analytic argument. For real-valued functions on , define the box norm by
All four variables are sampled as independent random variables with replacement, so repeated coordinates are included. The defining fourth power equals
If it vanishes, every summand vanishes. In particular, the terms give for each , so . Absolute homogeneity of a norm follows directly: .
For the triangle inequality, prove the mixed box Cauchy-Schwarz inequality. Write
Separating the two averages and applying the Cauchy-Schwarz inequality in gives
Expanding the square and reversing the order of finite sums,
by a second Cauchy-Schwarz inequality. Thus . Expand into its sixteen multilinear terms and apply this bound to each term. Their upper bounds sum to . Taking fourth roots yields the triangle inequality. Together with definiteness of a norm and absolute homogeneity of a norm, this proves the box norm is a norm. Complex functions require conjugates and are outside the printed real-valued convention.
For the bilinear correlation bound for the box norm, use the normalized L2 norm: let and , . The Cauchy-Schwarz inequality in gives
The remaining factor is . By the Cauchy-Schwarz inequality in , its magnitude is at most
Taking square roots proves
For the tripartite graph, assume its parts are nonempty and write for its adjacency indicator functions. Let , so . The normalized triangle count is
The constant-degree hypothesis is exactly for each . Therefore the contribution of the constant is
For fixed , apply the bilinear correlation bound for the box norm with and . Since these are indicator functions, and , the fraction of adjacent to . Averaging and applying the Cauchy-Schwarz inequality in gives the sharper triangle counting with one box-uniform pair and constant opposite degree estimate
Multiplying by yields
The middle bound also handles or , when the triangle count is zero.
To connect explicitly with the suggested expansion, put , . Both have overall mean zero, and for every . Consequently ; all terms with constant reduce to . The terms containing combine into the single error just estimated. This is where the exact degree assumption is used. If any part is empty the triangle count itself is zero, but the printed uniform expectations and edge density of a bipartite graph values would be undefined; the nonempty-parts convention must therefore be stated rather than dividing by zero.
Seminorm Created 2026-09-28 Updated 2026-10-14
A seminorm on a real or complex vector space is a finite-valued function satisfying absolute homogeneity and the triangle inequality:
In particular and . A seminorm is a norm exactly when implies : this is the extra definiteness of a norm axiom. The zero function is a valid seminorm. The missing definiteness is useful when a measurement deliberately ignores some directions, such as an individual coordinate or the constant term of a function whose derivative is measured.
For example, on the function is a seminorm that vanishes on every constant function. Adding the value measurement gives the norm : if , the fundamental theorem of calculus gives . A family of such partial measurements defines a seminorm topology.