---
name: "sigcensus"
section: "1"
platform: "linux"
package: "regina"
version: "7.4.1-4"
release: "Arch Linux 2026-11-01"
platforms: ["linux"]
url: "https://new.carta.tech/sigcensus"
---

# sigcensus(1)

Form a census of splitting surface signatures

## NAME

sigcensus - Form a census of splitting surface signatures

## SYNOPSIS

**sigcensus** *order*

**sigcensus** { **-v, --version** \| **-?, --help** }

## DESCRIPTION

Forms a census of all splitting surface signatures of the given order.  The *order* is the number of quadrilaterals in the resulting splitting surface.

The signatures will be written to standard output, one per line, followed by a count of the total number of signatures found.

Each signature will be output precisely once up to equivalence. Signatures are considered equivalent if they are related by some combination of:

- •

  relabelling symbols;

- •

  rotating an individual cycle;

- •

  inverting an individual cycle (i.e., reversing the cycle and changing the case of each symbol in the cycle);

- •

  reversing all cycles without changing the case of any symbols.

Upper-case symbols in signatures are not yet supported; this program will only output signatures whose symbols are all lower-case.

For more information on splitting surface signatures, see Burton's PhD thesis at **http://www.maths.uq.edu.au/~bab/papers/**.

## OPTIONS

- **-v, --version**

  Show which version of Regina is being used, and exit immediately.

- **-?, --help**

  Display brief usage information, and exit immediately.

## MACOS USERS

If you downloaded a drag-and-drop app bundle, this utility is shipped inside it.  If you dragged Regina to the main Applications folder, you can run it as /Applications/Regina.app/Contents/MacOS/sigcensus.

## WINDOWS USERS

The command-line utilities are installed beneath the *Program Files* directory; on some machines this directory is called *Program Files (x86)*. You can start this utility by running c:\\Program Files\\Regina\\Regina 7.4.1\\bin\\sigcensus.exe.

## SEE ALSO

censuslookup, tricensus, regina-gui.

## AUTHOR

This utility was written by Benjamin Burton \<bab@maths.uq.edu.au\>. Many people have been involved in the development of Regina; see the users' handbook for a full list of credits.