See close enough for government work on Wiktionary
Download JSON data for close enough for government work meaning in All languages combined (2.5kB)
{
"etymology_text": "Originally nonironic (meaning good enough to meet especially high standards); later evolved to mean good enough, though only barely.",
"head_templates": [
{
"args": {
"1": "-",
"head": "close enough for government work"
},
"expansion": "close enough for government work (not comparable)",
"name": "en-adj"
}
],
"lang": "English",
"lang_code": "en",
"pos": "adj",
"senses": [
{
"categories": [
{
"kind": "other",
"name": "American English",
"parents": [],
"source": "w"
},
{
"_dis": "57 43",
"kind": "other",
"name": "English entries with incorrect language header",
"parents": [
"Entries with incorrect language header",
"Entry maintenance"
],
"source": "w+disamb"
}
],
"glosses": [
"Adequate: acceptable as government work, imperfect but not worth the time nor effort of improving."
],
"id": "en-close_enough_for_government_work-en-adj-5xSWWIZ8",
"links": [
[
"humorous",
"humorous"
],
[
"derogatory",
"derogatory"
],
[
"Adequate",
"adequate"
],
[
"acceptable",
"acceptable"
],
[
"government",
"government"
],
[
"work",
"work"
],
[
"imperfect",
"imperfect"
],
[
"but",
"but"
],
[
"not",
"not"
],
[
"worth",
"worth"
],
[
"time",
"time"
],
[
"effort",
"effort"
],
[
"improving",
"improving"
]
],
"raw_glosses": [
"(US, idiomatic, humorous, derogatory) Adequate: acceptable as government work, imperfect but not worth the time nor effort of improving."
],
"tags": [
"US",
"derogatory",
"humorous",
"idiomatic",
"not-comparable"
]
},
{
"categories": [
{
"kind": "other",
"name": "Canadian English",
"parents": [],
"source": "w"
}
],
"glosses": [
"Acceptable: equivalent to government work, neither worse nor better."
],
"id": "en-close_enough_for_government_work-en-adj-LWdmB-Py",
"links": [
[
"humorous",
"humorous"
],
[
"Acceptable",
"acceptable"
],
[
"equivalent",
"equivalent"
],
[
"government",
"government"
],
[
"work",
"work"
],
[
"neither",
"neither"
],
[
"worse",
"worse"
],
[
"better",
"better"
]
],
"raw_glosses": [
"(Canada, idiomatic, humorous) Acceptable: equivalent to government work, neither worse nor better."
],
"tags": [
"Canada",
"humorous",
"idiomatic",
"not-comparable"
]
}
],
"sounds": [
{
"audio": "en-au-close enough for government work.ogg",
"mp3_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/transcoded/2/23/En-au-close_enough_for_government_work.ogg/En-au-close_enough_for_government_work.ogg.mp3",
"ogg_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/23/En-au-close_enough_for_government_work.ogg",
"tags": [
"Australia"
],
"text": "Audio (AU)"
}
],
"synonyms": [
{
"_dis1": "53 47",
"word": "satisfactory"
}
],
"word": "close enough for government work"
}
{
"categories": [
"English adjectives",
"English entries with incorrect language header",
"English lemmas",
"English multiword terms",
"English terms with audio links",
"English uncomparable adjectives"
],
"etymology_text": "Originally nonironic (meaning good enough to meet especially high standards); later evolved to mean good enough, though only barely.",
"head_templates": [
{
"args": {
"1": "-",
"head": "close enough for government work"
},
"expansion": "close enough for government work (not comparable)",
"name": "en-adj"
}
],
"lang": "English",
"lang_code": "en",
"pos": "adj",
"senses": [
{
"categories": [
"American English",
"English derogatory terms",
"English humorous terms",
"English idioms"
],
"glosses": [
"Adequate: acceptable as government work, imperfect but not worth the time nor effort of improving."
],
"links": [
[
"humorous",
"humorous"
],
[
"derogatory",
"derogatory"
],
[
"Adequate",
"adequate"
],
[
"acceptable",
"acceptable"
],
[
"government",
"government"
],
[
"work",
"work"
],
[
"imperfect",
"imperfect"
],
[
"but",
"but"
],
[
"not",
"not"
],
[
"worth",
"worth"
],
[
"time",
"time"
],
[
"effort",
"effort"
],
[
"improving",
"improving"
]
],
"raw_glosses": [
"(US, idiomatic, humorous, derogatory) Adequate: acceptable as government work, imperfect but not worth the time nor effort of improving."
],
"tags": [
"US",
"derogatory",
"humorous",
"idiomatic",
"not-comparable"
]
},
{
"categories": [
"Canadian English",
"English humorous terms",
"English idioms"
],
"glosses": [
"Acceptable: equivalent to government work, neither worse nor better."
],
"links": [
[
"humorous",
"humorous"
],
[
"Acceptable",
"acceptable"
],
[
"equivalent",
"equivalent"
],
[
"government",
"government"
],
[
"work",
"work"
],
[
"neither",
"neither"
],
[
"worse",
"worse"
],
[
"better",
"better"
]
],
"raw_glosses": [
"(Canada, idiomatic, humorous) Acceptable: equivalent to government work, neither worse nor better."
],
"tags": [
"Canada",
"humorous",
"idiomatic",
"not-comparable"
]
}
],
"sounds": [
{
"audio": "en-au-close enough for government work.ogg",
"mp3_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/transcoded/2/23/En-au-close_enough_for_government_work.ogg/En-au-close_enough_for_government_work.ogg.mp3",
"ogg_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/23/En-au-close_enough_for_government_work.ogg",
"tags": [
"Australia"
],
"text": "Audio (AU)"
}
],
"synonyms": [
{
"word": "satisfactory"
}
],
"word": "close enough for government work"
}
This page is a part of the kaikki.org machine-readable All languages combined dictionary. This dictionary is based on structured data extracted on 2024-05-03 from the enwiktionary dump dated 2024-05-02 using wiktextract (f4fd8c9 and c9440ce). The data shown on this site has been post-processed and various details (e.g., extra categories) removed, some information disambiguated, and additional data merged from other sources. See the raw data download page for the unprocessed wiktextract data.
If you use this data in academic research, please cite Tatu Ylonen: Wiktextract: Wiktionary as Machine-Readable Structured Data, Proceedings of the 13th Conference on Language Resources and Evaluation (LREC), pp. 1317-1325, Marseille, 20-25 June 2022. Linking to the relevant page(s) under https://kaikki.org would also be greatly appreciated.