"metaclass" meaning in English

See metaclass in All languages combined, or Wiktionary

Noun

Forms: metaclasses [plural]
Etymology: meta- + class Etymology templates: {{prefix|en|meta|class}} meta- + class Head templates: {{en-noun}} metaclass (plural metaclasses)
  1. (object-oriented programming) A class that serves as a template for other classes rather than objects. Wikipedia link: metaclass Categories (topical): Object-oriented programming Related terms: metatype Translations (object-oriented programming): metaluokka (Finnish), métaclasse [feminine] (French), Metaklasse [feminine] (German), metaklasa [feminine] (Polish)
    Sense id: en-metaclass-en-noun-P6WzQJHd Categories (other): English entries with incorrect language header, English terms prefixed with meta-

Inflected forms

Download JSON data for metaclass meaning in English (2.6kB)

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      "args": {
        "1": "en",
        "2": "meta",
        "3": "class"
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      "expansion": "meta- + class",
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    }
  ],
  "etymology_text": "meta- + class",
  "forms": [
    {
      "form": "metaclasses",
      "tags": [
        "plural"
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  ],
  "head_templates": [
    {
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  "lang_code": "en",
  "pos": "noun",
  "senses": [
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        {
          "kind": "other",
          "name": "English entries with incorrect language header",
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          "name": "English terms prefixed with meta-",
          "parents": [],
          "source": "w"
        },
        {
          "kind": "topical",
          "langcode": "en",
          "name": "Object-oriented programming",
          "orig": "en:Object-oriented programming",
          "parents": [
            "Programming",
            "Computing",
            "Software engineering",
            "Technology",
            "Computer science",
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            "Media",
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      "examples": [
        {
          "ref": "1997, John Hunt, Smalltalk and Object Orientation: An Introduction, Springer Science & Business Media, page 345",
          "text": "That is, all metaclasses (such as Collection class, Object class and Set class) are instances of the class Metaclass. This is because all metaclasses have the same behavior. They define the structure, definition and behavior of a class.",
          "type": "quotation"
        },
        {
          "ref": "2009, David Beazley, Python Essential Reference, Addison-Wesley Professional, page 139",
          "text": "First, the class can explicitly specify its metaclass by either setting a __metaclass__ class variable (Python 2), or supplying the metaclass keyword argument in the tuple of base classes (Python 3).",
          "type": "quotation"
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "A class that serves as a template for other classes rather than objects."
      ],
      "id": "en-metaclass-en-noun-P6WzQJHd",
      "links": [
        [
          "object-oriented programming",
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      "qualifier": "object-oriented programming",
      "raw_glosses": [
        "(object-oriented programming) A class that serves as a template for other classes rather than objects."
      ],
      "related": [
        {
          "word": "metatype"
        }
      ],
      "translations": [
        {
          "code": "fi",
          "lang": "Finnish",
          "sense": "object-oriented programming",
          "word": "metaluokka"
        },
        {
          "code": "fr",
          "lang": "French",
          "sense": "object-oriented programming",
          "tags": [
            "feminine"
          ],
          "word": "métaclasse"
        },
        {
          "code": "de",
          "lang": "German",
          "sense": "object-oriented programming",
          "tags": [
            "feminine"
          ],
          "word": "Metaklasse"
        },
        {
          "code": "pl",
          "lang": "Polish",
          "sense": "object-oriented programming",
          "tags": [
            "feminine"
          ],
          "word": "metaklasa"
        }
      ],
      "wikipedia": [
        "metaclass"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "word": "metaclass"
}
{
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  "etymology_text": "meta- + class",
  "forms": [
    {
      "form": "metaclasses",
      "tags": [
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      ]
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  ],
  "head_templates": [
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  "lang": "English",
  "lang_code": "en",
  "pos": "noun",
  "related": [
    {
      "word": "metatype"
    }
  ],
  "senses": [
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        {
          "ref": "1997, John Hunt, Smalltalk and Object Orientation: An Introduction, Springer Science & Business Media, page 345",
          "text": "That is, all metaclasses (such as Collection class, Object class and Set class) are instances of the class Metaclass. This is because all metaclasses have the same behavior. They define the structure, definition and behavior of a class.",
          "type": "quotation"
        },
        {
          "ref": "2009, David Beazley, Python Essential Reference, Addison-Wesley Professional, page 139",
          "text": "First, the class can explicitly specify its metaclass by either setting a __metaclass__ class variable (Python 2), or supplying the metaclass keyword argument in the tuple of base classes (Python 3).",
          "type": "quotation"
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "A class that serves as a template for other classes rather than objects."
      ],
      "links": [
        [
          "object-oriented programming",
          "object-oriented programming"
        ],
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          "class",
          "class"
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      "raw_glosses": [
        "(object-oriented programming) A class that serves as a template for other classes rather than objects."
      ],
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    }
  ],
  "translations": [
    {
      "code": "fi",
      "lang": "Finnish",
      "sense": "object-oriented programming",
      "word": "metaluokka"
    },
    {
      "code": "fr",
      "lang": "French",
      "sense": "object-oriented programming",
      "tags": [
        "feminine"
      ],
      "word": "métaclasse"
    },
    {
      "code": "de",
      "lang": "German",
      "sense": "object-oriented programming",
      "tags": [
        "feminine"
      ],
      "word": "Metaklasse"
    },
    {
      "code": "pl",
      "lang": "Polish",
      "sense": "object-oriented programming",
      "tags": [
        "feminine"
      ],
      "word": "metaklasa"
    }
  ],
  "word": "metaclass"
}

This page is a part of the kaikki.org machine-readable English 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.