In the convention used by mathlib, a pretriangulated category is a with a , an additive [1][1] (so (f+g)[1]=f[1]+g[1](f+g)[1]=f[1]+g[1] and 0[1]=00[1]=0), and a class Δ of , whose members are called distinguished, satisfying:

  1. distinguishedness is preserved by isomorphism;
  2. every contractible triangle XidXX0X[1]X\xrightarrow{\mathrm{id}_X}X\to0\to X[1] is distinguished;
  3. every morphism extends to a distinguished triangle;
  4. XfYgZhX[1]X\xrightarrow fY\xrightarrow gZ\xrightarrow hX[1] is distinguished exactly when its rotation YgZhX[1]f[1]Y[1]Y\xrightarrow gZ\xrightarrow hX[1]\xrightarrow{-f[1]}Y[1] is;
  5. a commuting square on the first maps of two distinguished triangles extends to a morphism of triangles.
Convention

This terminology is convention-sensitive. Here “triangulated” means pretriangulated plus the .