"skeleton crew" meaning in All languages combined

See skeleton crew on Wiktionary

Noun [English]

Audio: En-au-skeleton crew.ogg Forms: skeleton crews [plural]
Etymology: By metaphor, with the crew as a corporate body being bare bones rather than adequately fleshed out. Head templates: {{en-noun}} skeleton crew (plural skeleton crews)
  1. (idiomatic) The minimum number of personnel needed to operate and maintain an item at its most simple operating requirements, such as a ship or business, during an emergency or shutdown, and at the same time, to keep vital functions operating. Tags: idiomatic Related terms: short-staffed
    Sense id: en-skeleton_crew-en-noun-cOCc33Q~ Categories (other): English entries with incorrect language header, Pages with 1 entry, Pages with entries

Inflected forms

{
  "etymology_text": "By metaphor, with the crew as a corporate body being bare bones rather than adequately fleshed out.",
  "forms": [
    {
      "form": "skeleton crews",
      "tags": [
        "plural"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "head_templates": [
    {
      "args": {},
      "expansion": "skeleton crew (plural skeleton crews)",
      "name": "en-noun"
    }
  ],
  "lang": "English",
  "lang_code": "en",
  "pos": "noun",
  "senses": [
    {
      "categories": [
        {
          "kind": "other",
          "name": "English entries with incorrect language header",
          "parents": [
            "Entries with incorrect language header",
            "Entry maintenance"
          ],
          "source": "w"
        },
        {
          "kind": "other",
          "name": "Pages with 1 entry",
          "parents": [],
          "source": "w"
        },
        {
          "kind": "other",
          "name": "Pages with entries",
          "parents": [],
          "source": "w"
        }
      ],
      "examples": [
        {
          "ref": "2022 November 4, Kate Conger, Ryan Mac, Mike Isaac, “Confusion and Frustration Reign as Elon Musk Cuts Half of Twitter’s Staff”, in The New York Times, →ISSN:",
          "text": "The internet technology team — which is partly responsible for keeping the site functioning — became “a skeleton crew,” two people said.",
          "type": "quote"
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "The minimum number of personnel needed to operate and maintain an item at its most simple operating requirements, such as a ship or business, during an emergency or shutdown, and at the same time, to keep vital functions operating."
      ],
      "id": "en-skeleton_crew-en-noun-cOCc33Q~",
      "links": [
        [
          "minimum",
          "minimum"
        ],
        [
          "personnel",
          "personnel"
        ],
        [
          "operate",
          "operate"
        ],
        [
          "maintain",
          "maintain"
        ]
      ],
      "raw_glosses": [
        "(idiomatic) The minimum number of personnel needed to operate and maintain an item at its most simple operating requirements, such as a ship or business, during an emergency or shutdown, and at the same time, to keep vital functions operating."
      ],
      "related": [
        {
          "word": "short-staffed"
        }
      ],
      "tags": [
        "idiomatic"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "sounds": [
    {
      "audio": "En-au-skeleton crew.ogg",
      "mp3_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/transcoded/7/75/En-au-skeleton_crew.ogg/En-au-skeleton_crew.ogg.mp3",
      "ogg_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/75/En-au-skeleton_crew.ogg"
    }
  ],
  "word": "skeleton crew"
}
{
  "etymology_text": "By metaphor, with the crew as a corporate body being bare bones rather than adequately fleshed out.",
  "forms": [
    {
      "form": "skeleton crews",
      "tags": [
        "plural"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "head_templates": [
    {
      "args": {},
      "expansion": "skeleton crew (plural skeleton crews)",
      "name": "en-noun"
    }
  ],
  "lang": "English",
  "lang_code": "en",
  "pos": "noun",
  "related": [
    {
      "word": "short-staffed"
    }
  ],
  "senses": [
    {
      "categories": [
        "English countable nouns",
        "English entries with incorrect language header",
        "English idioms",
        "English lemmas",
        "English multiword terms",
        "English nouns",
        "English terms with quotations",
        "Pages with 1 entry",
        "Pages with entries"
      ],
      "examples": [
        {
          "ref": "2022 November 4, Kate Conger, Ryan Mac, Mike Isaac, “Confusion and Frustration Reign as Elon Musk Cuts Half of Twitter’s Staff”, in The New York Times, →ISSN:",
          "text": "The internet technology team — which is partly responsible for keeping the site functioning — became “a skeleton crew,” two people said.",
          "type": "quote"
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "The minimum number of personnel needed to operate and maintain an item at its most simple operating requirements, such as a ship or business, during an emergency or shutdown, and at the same time, to keep vital functions operating."
      ],
      "links": [
        [
          "minimum",
          "minimum"
        ],
        [
          "personnel",
          "personnel"
        ],
        [
          "operate",
          "operate"
        ],
        [
          "maintain",
          "maintain"
        ]
      ],
      "raw_glosses": [
        "(idiomatic) The minimum number of personnel needed to operate and maintain an item at its most simple operating requirements, such as a ship or business, during an emergency or shutdown, and at the same time, to keep vital functions operating."
      ],
      "tags": [
        "idiomatic"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "sounds": [
    {
      "audio": "En-au-skeleton crew.ogg",
      "mp3_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/transcoded/7/75/En-au-skeleton_crew.ogg/En-au-skeleton_crew.ogg.mp3",
      "ogg_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/75/En-au-skeleton_crew.ogg"
    }
  ],
  "word": "skeleton crew"
}

Download raw JSONL data for skeleton crew meaning in All languages combined (1.9kB)


This page is a part of the kaikki.org machine-readable All languages combined dictionary. This dictionary is based on structured data extracted on 2024-11-06 from the enwiktionary dump dated 2024-10-02 using wiktextract (fbeafe8 and 7f03c9b). 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.