Categorical structures enriched in a quantaloid: categories, distributors and functors

Abstract

We thoroughly treat several familiar and less familiar definitions and results concerning categories, functors and distributors enriched in a base quantaloid Q. In analogy with V-category theory we discuss such things as adjoint functors, (pointwise) left Kan extensions, weighted (co)limits, presheaves and free (co)completion, Cauchy completion and Morita equivalence. With an appendix on the universality of the quantaloid Dist(Q) of Q-enriched categories and distributors.