A geometric consequence of residual smallness (Q1304544)

The authors describe a new way to construct large subdirectly irreducibles within an equational class of algebras. This construction is used to show that there are forbidden geometries of multitraces for finite algebras in residually small equational classes. The construction is first applied to show that minimal equational classes generated by simple algebras of types 2, 3, or 4 are residually small iff they are congruence modular. A second application of the construction is the characterization of residually small locally finite abelian equational classes.