A new concept (notion) of the practical stability of positive fractional discrete-time linear systems is introduced. Necessary and sufficient conditions for the practical stability of the positive fractional systems are established. It is shown that the positive fractional systems are practically unstable if corresponding standard positive fractional systems are asymptotically unstable.
In the paper the practical stability problem for the discrete, non-integer order model of one dimmensional heat transfer process is discussed. The conditions associating the practical stability to sample time and maximal size of finite-dimensional approximation of heat transfer model are proposed. These conditions are formulated with the use of spectrum decoposition property and practical stability conditions for scalar, positive, fractional order systems. Results are illustrated by a numerical example.