KifejezésPoints

KifejezésPoints (KP) is a metric used in computer science and language education to quantify the complexity or expressiveness of a mathematical or programming expression. The concept draws on the Hungarian word kifejezés, meaning expression, and combines syntactic features with semantic considerations to yield a single score. There is no universal standard for KP, and implementations vary by context.

Calculation of KP(E) typically relies on a weighted sum of features extracted from the expression E. A common form is KP(E) = α·T(E) + β·O(E) + γ·D(E) + δ·S(E), where T is the token count, O is the operator count, D is the depth or nesting level of the expression tree, and S is a semantic complexity score based on the variety and arity of functions used. Weights α, β, γ, and δ are chosen to reflect the goals of the analysis, such as difficulty assessment or readability.

In practice, KP increases with more tokens, more operators, deeper nesting, and greater semantic variety. For example, a simple expression like x + y has a relatively low KP, while a nested form such as f(g(x), h(y, z)) yields a higher KP due to added tokens, operators, and nesting levels.

Applications of KP include educational assessment, where it helps compare student responses and tailor feedback; tooling for code analysis and refactoring, where it highlights particularly complex expressions; and search or repository ranking, where expression difficulty can inform retrieval results. The concept remains a formalization used in certain curricula and software engineering tools, rather than a universally adopted standard. See also expression complexity, code metrics, and readability studies.