Arzelàʹs Theorem and strong uniform convergence on bornologies

In 1883 Arzelà (1983/1984) [2] gave a necessary and sufficient condition via quasi-uniform convergence for the pointwise limit of a sequence of real-valued continuous functions on a compact interval to be continuous. Arzelàʹs work paved the way for several outstanding papers. A milestone was the P.S. Alexandroff convergence introduced in 1948 to tackle the question for a sequence of continuous functions from a topological space (not necessarily compact) to a metric space. In 2009, in the realm of metric spaces, Beer and Levi (2009) [10] found another necessary and sufficient condition through the novel notion of strong uniform convergence on finite sets. We offer a direct proof of the equivalence of Arzelà, Alexandroff and Beer–Levi conditions. The proof reveals the internal gear of these important convergences and sheds more light on the problem. We also study the main properties of the topology of strong uniform convergence of functions on bornologies, initiated in Beer and Levi (2009) [10].