Categorical non-abelian cohomology and the Schreier theory of groupoids (Q2574928)

The central result of this paper is the classification of extensions of groupoids by the non-abelian cohomology of order 2 generalizing the Schreier's theory for groups. Like in a reviewer's paper [\textit{G. Hoff}, ``Cohomologies et extensions de catégories'', Math. Scand. 74, 191--207 (1994; Zbl 0823.18007)], these extensions are Grothendieck's fibrations whose fibers are groups. The theory is developed with a 2-categorical point of view: crossed modules are 2-groupoids, cocycles are lax 2-functors and the cocycle conditions are the coherence axioms for lax 2-functors. The non-abelian cohomology has also a representation in terms of homotopy classes of simplicial maps using the Street's geometric nerve of a 2-category considered by the authors in a preceding paper [Appl. Categ. Struct. 13, 223--233 (2005; Zbl 1099.18003)].