Relations With Groupoids
One of the ways of expressing the algebraic content of the theory of covering spaces is using groupoids and the fundamental groupoid. The latter functor gives an equivalence of categories
between the category of covering spaces of a reasonably nice space X and the category of groupoid covering morphisms of π1(X). Thus a particular kind of map of spaces is well modelled by a particular kind of morphism of groupoids. The category of covering morphisms of a groupoid G is also equivalent to the category of actions of G on sets, and this allows the recovery of more traditional classifications of coverings. Proofs of these facts are given in the book 'Topology and Groupoids' referenced below.
Read more about this topic: Covering Space
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“It is commonplace that a problem stated is well on its way to solution, for statement of the nature of a problem signifies that the underlying quality is being transformed into determinate distinctions of terms and relations or has become an object of articulate thought.”
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