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Work with real vector bundles; for complex bundles replace the inner products below by positive-definite Hermitian forms. A smooth rank-$r$ vector bundle is a smooth total space $E$ with a smooth projection $\pi :E\to M$, a real vector space structure on each fiber $E_p$, and an open cover with vector bundle trivializationsEach ${\Phi }_i$ is a diffeomorphism over $U_i$ and is linear on fibers. The overlap maps have the form $(p,v)\mapsto (p,A_{ji}(p)v)$, where $A_{ji}:U_i\cap U_j\to G{L}_r(\mathbb{R})$ is smooth. The rank of a vector bundle may be specified separately on each connected component.

A smooth fiber metric is a positive-definite symmetric bilinear form $h_p$ on each fiber, with smoothly varying coefficients in every local frame. Equivalently it is a smooth section of ${\mathrm{Sym}}^2{E}^{\ast }$ which is positive definite at every point. Each trivialization supplies a local fiber metric $h_i$ by pulling back the Euclidean inner product.

A smooth manifold is Hausdorff and second-countable, hence paracompact. Choose a smooth, locally finite partition of unity $\{{\varphi }_i\}$ subordinate to a trivializing cover, with ${\varphi }_i\ge 0$, $\mathrm{supp}{\varphi }_i\subset U_i$, and ${\sum }_i{\varphi }_i=1$. DefineExtend each weighted term by zero outside its trivializing set; its support lies inside that set, so the extension is smooth. Local finiteness makes the sum smooth. At a point $p$ and for $0\ne v\in E_p$, every nonzero term ${\varphi }_i(p)h_i(v,v)$ is positive and at least one such term occurs. Thus $h_p(v,v)>0$. This proves that every smooth vector bundle admits a smooth fiber metric.

The slope of a nonzero holomorphic vector bundle on a compact Riemann surface is its degree of a holomorphic vector bundle divided by its rank of a vector bundle. It measures degree per fibre dimension. Comparing subbundle slopes defines semistable holomorphic vector bundles.