dictionary

Etymology tree
Proto-Indo-European *deyḱ-
Proto-Indo-European *déyḱti
Proto-Italic *deikō
Latin dīcō
Proto-Indo-European *-tis
Proto-Italic *-tjō
Latin -tiō
Latin dictiō
Latin -ārium
Medieval Latin dictiōnāriumlbor.
Middle English dixionare
English dictionary
From Middle English dixionare, a learned borrowing from Medieval Latin dictiōnārium, from Latin dictiōnārius, from dictiō (“a speaking”), from dictus, perfect past participle of dīcō (“to speak”) + -ārium (“room, place”). By surface analysis, diction + -ary.

etymon

User calls RouteCollection.GetVirtualPath, passing in a RequestContext, a dictionary of values, and an optional route name used to select the correct route to generate the URL.

2011, Jon Galloway, Phil Haack, Brad Wilson, Professional ASP.NET MVC 3:

(computing) An associative array, a data structure where each value is referenced by a particular key, analogous to words and definitions in a dictionary (sense 1).


free

en-adj

free (comparative freer or more free, superlative freest or most free)

freer (comparative)
more free (comparative)
freest (superlative)
most free (superlative)

From Middle English free, fre, freo, from Old English frēo (“free”), from Proto-West Germanic *frī, from Proto-Germanic *frijaz (“beloved, not in bondage”), from Proto-Indo-European *priHós (“pleased, loved”), from *preyH- (“to please, love”). Related to friend.
cognates, etc
Germanic cognates include West Frisian frij (“free”), Dutch vrij (“free”), Low German free (“free”), German frei (“free”), Danish, Swedish and Norwegian fri (“free”).
Other cognates include Sanskrit प्रिय (priyá-, “beloved”).
Germanic and Celtic are the only Indo-European language branches in which the PIE word with the meaning of "dear, beloved" acquired the additional meaning of "free" in the sense of "not in bondage". This was an extension of the idea of "characteristic of those who are dear and beloved", in other words friends and tribe members (in contrast to unfree inhabitants from other tribes and prisoners of war, many of which were among the slaves – compare the Latin use of liberi to mean both "free persons" and "children of a family").
The verb comes from Middle English freen, freoȝen, from Old English frēon, frēoġan (“to free; make free”), from Proto-West Germanic *frijōn, from Proto-Germanic *frijōną, from Proto-Indo-European *preyH-, and is cognate with German freien, Dutch vrijen, Czech přát, Serbo-Croatian prijati, Polish sprzyjać.

inh

there ain't no such thing as a free lunch

why buy the cow when you can get the milk for free

OpenOffice is free software.

en:unconstrained, socially
en:of software, licensed in an open way

(software) With no or only freedom-preserving limitations on distribution or modification.

lejuar

software: with very few limitations on distribution or improvement

en:unconstrained, socially
en:of software, intended for release

(software) Intended for release, as opposed to a checked version.

en:unconstrained, abstractly
en:albegraically generic or universal

(algebra, of an algebraic structure) In any of various technical senses generic, universal.

(most generally, category theory, of an object F in a concrete category, with respect to a set X and a map i from X to the underlying set of F) Such that any map f from X to the underlying set of an object A in the same category as F induces a map ̄f from F to A which is compatible with f (i.e. such that f=̄f∘i).

(programming) Unconstrained of identifiers, not bound.


free

en-verb

free (third-person singular simple present frees, present participle freeing, simple past and past participle freed)

frees (present singular third-person)
freeing (participle present)
freed (participle past)
freed (past)

There is no way to access that original area of memory, nor is there any way to free it before the program ends.

2002, Jesse Liberty, SAMS Teach Yourself C++ in 24 Hours, page 148:

(transitive, programming) To relinquish (previously allocated memory) to the system.

vapauttaa

programming: to relinquish (previously allocated memory) to the system


thesaurus

en-noun

thesaurus (plural thesauri or thesauruses)

16th century, from Latin thēsaurus, from Ancient Greek θησαυρός (thēsaurós, “storehouse, treasure”); its current English usage/meaning was established soon after the publication of Peter Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases in 1852. Doublet of treasure.

der

(information science) A hierarchy of subject headings: canonical titles of themes and topics, the titles serving as search keys.

tesaurus

information science: hierarchy of titles


cat

From concatenate, derived from the program's function of concatenating files. Compare concat.

(computing) A program and command in Unix that reads one or more files and directs their content to the standard output.


cat

en-verb

cat (third-person singular simple present cats, present participle catting, simple past and past participle catted)

cats (present singular third-person)
catting (participle present)
catted (participle past)
catted (past)

(computing, transitive) To apply the cat command to (one or more files).

(computing, slang) To dump large amounts of data on (an unprepared target), usually with no intention of browsing it carefully.


word

en-noun

word (countable and uncountable, plural words)

desc

Chinese Pidgin English: word, 𭉉 (Chinese spelling)

From Middle English word, from Old English word, from Proto-West Germanic *word, from Proto-Germanic *wurdą, from Proto-Indo-European *wr̥dʰh₁om. Doublet of verb and verve; further related to vrata.

you get more with a kind word and a gun than you do with a kind word alone

The size of a register in the MIPS architecture is 32 bits; groups of 32 bits occur so frequently that they are given the name word in the MIPS architecture.

1997, John L. Hennessy with David A. Patterson, Computer Organization and Design, 2nd edition, San Francisco, California: Morgan Kaufmann Publishers, Inc., §3.3, page 109:

(computing) A fixed-size group of bits handled as a unit by a machine and which can be stored in or retrieved from a typical register (so that it has the same size as such a register).

woord

computing: fixed-size group of bits handled as a unit

(computer science) A finite string that is not a command or operator.

sana

computer science: finite string which is not a command or operator


GNU FDL

GNU Free Documentation License
w:GNU Free Documentation License

(computing, copyright law) Initialism of GNU Free Documentation License.


denotation

en-noun

denotation (countable and uncountable, plural denotations)

From Late Latin dēnotātiō, from Latin dēnotāre (“to denote, mark out”) + -tiō (suffix forming nouns of action), from dē- (“completely”) + notāre (“to mark”); equivalent to denote + -ation.

denotational semantics
denotational semantics

(computer science) Any mathematical object which describes the meanings of expressions from the languages, formalized in the theory of denotational semantics


synonym

From Middle English sinonyme, from Latin synōnymum, from Ancient Greek συνώνυμον (sunṓnumon), neuter singular form of συνώνυμος (sunṓnumos, “synonymous”), from σύν (sún, “with”) + ὄνομα (ónoma, “name”). By surface analysis, syn- + -onym.

Synonyms are part of the SQL standard and are used frequently by Oracle DBAs. Note that Oracle includes both private and public synonyms.

2011, Paul Nielsen, Uttam Parui, Microsoft SQL Server 2008 Bible:

(databases) An alternative (often shorter) name defined for an object in a database.


dialect

From Middle French dialecte, from Latin dialectos, dialectus, from Ancient Greek διάλεκτος (diálektos, “conversation, the language of a country or a place or a nation, the local idiom which derives from a dominant language”), from διαλέγομαι (dialégomai, “I participate in a dialogue”), from διά (diá, “inter, through”) + λέγω (légō, “I speak”); by surface analysis, dia- + -lect.

der

Home computers in the 1980s had many incompatible dialects of BASIC.

programming language
programming language

(computing, programming) A variant of a non-standardized programming language.


semantics

en-noun

semantics (countable and uncountable, plural semantics)

From French sémantique, displacing earlier semasiology. From Ancient Greek σημαντικός (sēmantikós). By surface analysis, semantic + -ics.

file sharing and locking semantics

(computer science) The meaning of computer language constructs, in contrast to their form or syntax.


noun

From Middle English noun, from Anglo-Norman noun, non, nom, from Latin nōmen (“name; noun”). The grammatical sense in Latin was a semantic loan from Koine Greek ὄνομα (ónoma). Doublet of name and nomen.

Nouns are the data; verbs are the data transformations, and therefore verbs represent much of the complexity of systems.

1992, Brad A. Myers, David C. Smith, Bruce Horn, chapter 19, in Languages for Developing User Interfaces:

You choose either (1) the verb (change font) first and then select the noun (the paragraph) to which the verb should apply or (2) the noun first and then apply the verb.

2000, Jeff Raskin, The Humane Interface, page 59:

Thus, in essence, the mouse provides a capability for picking among a set of nouns (for instance, the file to which to apply some action) and verbs (such as "edit" or "insert")

2005, Barbara J. Grosz, Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society, volume 149, number 4:

(computing) An object within a user interface to which a certain action or transformation (i.e., verb) is applied.


swap

From the verb swap. First attested in 1620.

How much swap do you need?

(computing, informal, uncountable) Space available in a swap file for use as auxiliary memory.


verb

From Middle English verbe, directly from Latin verbum (“word, verb”), reinforced by Old French verbe, from Proto-Indo-European *werdʰo-. Doublet of verve and word.

You can invoke the Properties OLE verb in many ways. The easiest way is to move the mouse over the border of the control until it becomes only a four-way pointer and then right-click.

1995, Adam Denning, OLE Controls Inside Out, page 321:

The InfiniBand verbs, which are closely modeled in the “Gen2” interface, provide the functional specification for the operations that should be allowed on an InfiniBand compliant adapter.

2016, Ada Gavrilovska, Attaining High Performance Communications: A Vertical Approach:

(programming) A named command that performs a specific operation on an object.


head

head (countable and uncountable, plural heads or head)

→ Japanese: ヘッド (heddo)

Sranan Tongo: ede

Aukan: ede

Saramaccan: hédi

Etymology tree
Proto-Indo-European *kap-
Proto-Indo-European *káput-
Proto-Germanic *haubudą
Old English hēafod
Middle English heed
English head
From Middle English hed, heed, heved, heaved, from Old English hēafd-, hēafod (“head; top; source, origin; chief, leader; capital”), from Proto-West Germanic *haubud, from Proto-Germanic *haubudą (“head”), from Proto-Indo-European *káput. The modern word comes from Old English oblique stem hēafd-, the expected Modern English outcome for hēafod would be *heaved (similar to the Middle English word). Doublet of cape, capo, caput, chef, chief, and Howth.
Cognate with Scots heid, hede, hevid, heved (“head”), Old English hafola (“head”), North Frisian hood (“head”), Dutch hoofd (“head”), German Haupt (“head”), Swedish huvud (“head”), Danish hoved (“head”), Icelandic höfuð (“head”), Latin caput (“head”), Sanskrit कपाल (kapāla, “skull”), Hindi कपाल (kapāl, “skull”).

頭

つぶり, tsuburi, つぃぶる, tsiburu, つぃぶるぃ, tsiburi

pää

have one's head screwed on the right way

know one's head from a hole in the ground

run around like a chicken with its head cut off

would lose one's head if it wasn't attached

would lose one's head if it wasn't bolted on

would lose one's head if it wasn't glued on

would lose one's head if it wasn't screwed on

would lose one's head if it wasn't stuck on

would lose one's head if it wasn't tied on

would lose one's head if it weren't attached

you can't put an old head on young shoulders

you can't put a wise head on young shoulders

(countable) The topmost, foremost, or leading part.

(countable) The principal operative part of a machine or tool.

(computing) The part of a disk drive responsible for reading and writing data.

гало́ўка

computing: part of a disk drive responsible for reading and writing data


name

→ Sranan Tongo: nen

→ Japanese: ネーム (nēmu)

PIE word
 *h₁nómn̥
From Middle English name, nome, from Old English nama, noma, from Proto-West Germanic *namō, from Proto-Germanic *namô, from Proto-Indo-European *h₁nómn̥. Cognates include Saterland Frisian Noome, West Frisian namme, Dutch naam, German Name, Danish navn, Swedish namn, Latin nōmen (whence Spanish nombre), Russian имя (imja), Sanskrit नामन् (nāman). Possible cognates outside of Indo-European include Finnish nimi and Hungarian név. Doublet of nomen and noun.

it doesn't matter what they say about you as long as they spell your name right

(computing) A unique identifier, generally a string of characters.


abort

→ Polish: abort

→ Portuguese: abort

From Middle English, from Latin abortus, perfect active participle of aborior (“miscarry”), formed from ab + orior (“come into being”). Doublet of abortus.

(computing) The function used to abort a process.

We've had three aborts over the last two days.

(computing) An event in which a process is aborted.


abort

en-verb

abort (third-person singular simple present aborts, present participle aborting, simple past and past participle aborted)

aborts (present singular third-person)
aborting (participle present)
aborted (participle past)
aborted (past)

From Latin abortare, from abortus, from aboriri (“miscarry”), from ab- (“not”) + oriri (“come into being, arise, appear”).

(transitive, computing) To terminate a process prior to completion.

終止 /终止

computing: to terminate a process prior to completion


y

Abbreviations.
y
# (stenoscript) the sound sequence /ɔɪ̯/.
# (stenoscript) Abbreviation of why.
# (stenoscript) the suffix -ry or -rry.


accept

First attested about 1380. From Middle English accepten, borrowed from Old French accepter, or directly from Latin acceptō, acceptāre (“receive”), frequentative of accipiō, formed from ad- + capiō (“to take”). Displaced native Old English onfōn.

Almost all line segments will be trivial accepts or trivial rejects, so the above covers the vast majority of cases.

1996, Jim Blinn, Jim Blinn's Corner: A Trip Down the Graphics Pipeline, page 127:


acceptor

From Middle English acceptour, from Latin acceptor, with the meanings from accept.

finite-state machine
finite-state machine

(computing theory) A kind of finite-state machine whose binary output indicates whether or not a received input was accepted.


accessibility

en-noun

accessibility (usually uncountable, plural accessibilities)

From accessible + -ity, after Late Latin accessibilitas, from Latin accessibilis.

The purpose of this study is to measure West Virginia University's website accessibility for students and users who are blind or visually impaired and compare that measurement to the measurement of other websites of […]

2007, Accessibility of WVU Websites for Individuals with Vision Impairments, ProQuest, →ISBN, page 4:

(computing, web design) Features that increase software usability for users with certain impairments.

無障礙 /无障碍

feature that increases software usability


accordion

→ Irish: acordán

desc

แอกคอร์เดียน

→ Thai: แอกคอร์เดียน (ɛ́k-kɔɔ-dîian)

→ Thai: แอกคอร์เดียน (ɛ́k-kɔɔ-dîian)

First attested in 1831. From German Akkordeon, from Akkord (“harmony”), from French accord, from Old French acorder, based on Italian accordare (“to tune”). See also accord.

graphical user interface
graphical user interface

(graphical user interface) A vertical list of items that can be individually expanded and collapsed to reveal their contents.


definition

en-noun

definition (countable and uncountable, plural definitions)

From Middle English diffinicioun, from Middle French definition, from Latin dēfīnītiō, from dēfīniō. Equivalent to define + -ition.

(programming) A statement which provides a previous declaration with a value or body of a subroutine (in the case of function).


libre

Sense 1 (“especially of the will: free, independent”) is borrowed from French libre (“at liberty, free; clear, free, vacant; free, without obligation”), from Latin līber (“free, unrestricted”), ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *h₁lewdʰ- (“people”).
Senses 2 (“(software) with very few limitations on distribution or improvement”) and 3 ("not enslaved") are either borrowed from the French word or the Spanish libre (“free: not enslaved or imprisoned; without obligation; unconstrained by distrust or timidity; not containing, without”), from the same Latin etymon as above.

bor

One more point leads toward Free Software in education: when students get jobs, they prefer to use tools they learned at school in order to minimize extra learning efforts. This fact should lead colleges to teach only those tools not owned by anyone—those that are libre.

1999 February, Alessandro Rubini, “Software Libre and Commercial Viability”, in Marjorie Richardson, editor, Linux Journal: The Monthly Magazine of the Linux Community, number 58, Seattle, Wash.: Specialized System Consultants, →ISSN, →OCLC, page 48, column 1:

The great potential of libre software for development and social inclusion has long been emphasized. The cost aspect of it, though it might act as a driver, is only one limited aspect of the benefits of libre software in developing countries, deprived regions, or urban areas. The empowerment of persons and groups to not only use technology, but understand it, at the level and rhythm that fits them, with the resulting ability to become active contributors and to innovate are the essence of libre software.

2005, Philippe Aigrain, “Libre Software Policies at the European Level”, in Joseph Feller, Brian Fitzgerald, Scott A. Hissam, Karim R. Lakhani, editors, Perspectives on Free and Open Source Software, Cambridge, Mass., London: MIT Press, →ISBN, pages 454–455:

The formal definition of Open Access, however, does require re-use rights to enable the article to be re-used in various ways (text-mined, translated into other languages, used in part in other products, etc.), [...]. This is what is known as ‘libre’ Open Access. ‘Libre’ Open Access does not yet constitute the bulk of Open Access literature. In institutional repositories the majority of articles are of the ‘gratis’ type, though a small proportion carry an appropriate (usually Creative Commons) licence and are ‘libre’.

2012, Alma Swan, “Section 3. The Importance of Open Access.”, in Policy Guidelines for the Development and Promotion of Open Access (Open Guidelines Series), Paris: United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization, →ISBN, section 3.2 (Levels of Open Access), page 25, column 2:

Free and open-source software (F/OSS, FOSS) or free/libre/open-source software (FLOSS) is a software that is both a free software and an open source. FOSS is a computer software that is available in source code (open source) form and that can be used, studied, copied, modified, and redistributed without restriction, or with restrictions that only ensure that further recipients have the same rights under which it was obtained (free or libre). Free software, software libre, or libre software is software that can be used, studied, and modified without restriction, and which can be copied and redistributed in modified or unmodified form either without restriction or with restrictions that only ensure that further recipients have the same rights under which it was obtained and that manufacturers of consumer products incorporating free software provide that software as source code.

2014, Joshua M. Pearce, “Introduction to Open-source Hardware for Science”, in Open-source Lab: How to Build Your Own Hardware and Reduce Research Costs, Waltham, Mass., Kidlington, Oxfordshire: Elsevier, →ISBN, section 1.2 (What is Open Source?), pages 1–2:

(software) With very few limitations on distribution or the right to access the source code to create improved versions, but not necessarily free of charge.


lens

en-noun

lens (plural lenses or (obsolete) lens or (rare) lentes)

lenses (plural)
lens (obsolete plural)
lentes (plural rare)

→ Bengali: লেন্স (lenś)

→ Turkish: lens

Borrowed from Latin lēns (“lentil”), with Medieval Latin later taking on the sense of “lens”, a semantic loan from Arabic عَدْسَة (ʕadsa, “lentil; optic lens”).

semantic loan

(programming) A construct used in statically-typed functional programming languages to access nested data structures.


your mileage may vary

The United States Environmental Protection Agency requires all new vehicles to undergo a set of standard emissions tests which simulate city and highway driving. Part of the test measures estimated city and highway gas (petrol) mileage estimates. Since no test can exactly simulate all driving habits and conditions, the actual gas mileage of each vehicle will vary. As a result, when these estimated mileage claims from automobile manufacturers appear in advertisements, they are almost always accompanied with the standard disclaimer “your mileage may vary”.

The battery lasts a day in my phone, but your mileage may vary.

When that definition is executed, the metadata for the temporary table is put into your schema (most likely—your mileage may vary), but no space is allocated to hold data.

1993, Jim Melton, Alan R. Simon, “Basic Data Definition Language (DDL)”, in Understanding the New SQL: A Complete Guide, San Francisco, Calif.: Morgan Kaufmann Publishers, →ISBN, section 4.3.4 (Temporary Tables), page 74:

In other words, your mileage may vary and my disk-size figures are just estimates provided for your convenience.

1994, Bob LeVitus, Macintosh System 7.5 for Dummies (For Dummies), San Mateo, Calif.: IDG Books, →ISBN, page 328:

We pause here to emphasize that with animals, there are no absolutes. […] We like to say that with any given wolf or dog, "your mileage may vary."

2012, Jessica Addams, Andrew Miller, “Modern Wolf Mythology: The Things that ‘Everyone Knows’”, in Between Dog and Wolf: Understanding the Connection and the Confusion, Wenatchee, Wash.: Dogwise Publishing, →ISBN:

Mallory Ortberg: […] The advice game is the ultimate your-mileage-may-vary exercise—do you have a feeling for when someone is looking for (or needs) a gentle smack to return them to their senses, a bit of empathy, a dose of humor? It’s a tricky balance, I think, between writing something entertaining for your many readers and trying to be genuinely helpful to the original writer.

2015 November 12, Daniel Mallory Ortberg, Emily Yoffe, “Dear Prudie, from Prudie: Emily Yoffe’s advice to her successor, Mallory Ortberg”, in Slate, archived from the original on 2018-02-07:

(Canada, US, idiomatic, often computing) It may work differently in your situation, or be different in your experience.

možná to máte jinak

it may work differently in your situation

ez mindenkinél másként/máshogy/máshogyan van/működik (persze)

э́то мо́жет срабо́тать у тебя́ по-друго́му


star

Sranan Tongo: stari
Aukan: sitali

→ Finnish: stara

→ French: star

→ German: Star

→ Italian: star

→ Swahili: staa

From Middle English sterre, from Old English steorra (“star”), from Proto-West Germanic *sterrō, variant of *sternō, from Proto-Germanic *sternô, *sternǭ (“star”), from Proto-Indo-European *h₂stḗr (“star”). Doublet of aster, stella, étoile, and estoile.
Cognates
Cognate with Scots starn, ster, North Frisian steer, West Frisian stjer, Saterland Frisian Stiern, Dutch ster, Luxembourgish Stär, German Stern, Yiddish שטערן (shtern), Vilamovian śtaom, Swedish stjärna, Norwegian stjerne, Icelandic stjarna, Gothic 𐍃𐍄𐌰𐌹𐍂𐌽𐍉 (stairnō), Spanish estrella, Portuguese estrela, Italian stella, Romanian stea, Occitan estela, Venetan stéła, Sicilian stidda, Sardinian isteddu, Mirandese streilha, Walloon sitoele, Romansch staila, Megleno-Romanian steau̯ă, Istriot stila, Istro-Romanian ste, Latin stēlla, Greek αστέρι (astéri), Ancient Greek ἀστήρ (astḗr), Old Armenian աստղ (astł), Persian ستاره (setâre), Tajik ситора (sitora), Pashto ستوری (storay), Mazanderani اساره (ëssâre), Northern Kurdish stêr, Central Kurdish ئەستێرە (estêre), Zazaki astare, Ossetian стъалы (st’aly), Hindi तारा (tārā), Urdu تارا (tārā), Punjabi ਤਾਰਾ (tārā), Gujarati તારો (tāro), Sanskrit तारा (tārā).

аеҵǝа

a celestial body appearing as a point of light on the clear night sky, whose position is relatively fixed with respect to each other

single point of failure
single point of failure

(networking) A network topology with multiple computers individually merging to one central switch, thus free of risk of collisions. A single point of failure can occur if the switch experiences corruption.


obfuscate

en-verb

obfuscate (third-person singular simple present obfuscates, present participle obfuscating, simple past and past participle obfuscated)

obfuscates (present singular third-person)
obfuscating (participle present)
obfuscated (participle past)
obfuscated (past)
obfuscate (infinitive)

explain

antonym(s) of “to deliberately make less confusing”

From Middle French obfusquer, from Old French offusquer, and the participle stem of Late Latin obfuscō, from Latin ob- + fuscō (“to darken”).

We need to obfuscate these classes before we ship the final release.

(computing) To alter code while preserving its behavior but concealing its structure and intent.


ASCII

Thus, to translate an EBCDIC message into an ASCII one we need a table with 256 one-byte entries. In each position we put the ASCII code that corresponds to that EBCDIC entry.

1989, D. Russell, The Principles of Computer Networking, Cambridge University Press, →ISBN, page 218:

In 1960 American Standard Code for Information Exchange (ASCII) was developed from telegraphic codes.

2021, Claire Cock-Starkey, Hyphens & Hashtags, Bodleian Library, page 127:

American Standard Code for Information Interchange#English

(computing) Acronym of American Standard Code for Information Interchange.


LDP

Linux Documentation Project
w:Linux Documentation Project

(computing) Initialism of Linux Documentation Project.

Label Distribution Protocol
w:Label Distribution Protocol

(networking) Initialism of Label Distribution Protocol.


alphabet

From Middle English alphabete, borrowed from Late Latin alphabētum, from Ancient Greek ἀλφάβητος (alphábētos), from ἄλφα (álpha) and βῆτα (bêta), the names of the first two letters of the Greek alphabet, Α (A) and Β (B), lowercase forms α and β. The Greek names derived from aleph, the name of the Phoenician letter 𐤀 (ʾ, “ox”) and beth, the name of the letter 𐤁 (b, “house”), so called because they were pictograms of those objects, having developed from the Egyptian hieroglyphs F1 (𓃾) and pr (𓉐).
 Doublet of alfabeto.

Let L be a regular language over the alphabet #92;Sigma.

(computer science) A typically finite set of distinguishable symbols.


FTP

FTP (third-person singular simple present FTPs, present participle FTPing, simple past and past participle FTPed)

FTPs (present singular third-person)
FTPing (participle present)
FTPed (participle past)
FTPed (past)

Just as newsgroups have certain rules to live by, there are several courtesies to remember when FTPing and telneting to remote sites […]

1995, Richard Wagner, Inside CompuServe:

Having saved header.php, I FTPed it back to the Sandbox theme folder, overwriting the old version.

2008, Paul Thewlis, WordPress for Business Bloggers:

File Transfer Protocol
File Transfer Protocol

(computing, transitive) To transfer using File Transfer Protocol.


GUI

Coordinate term: TUI

graphical user interface
graphical user interface#English

(computing) Initialism of graphical user interface.


OS

I've decided to install two different OSes on my new laptop.

Some vendors do now have a variant of the per-unit royalty (usually termed a “shared risk,” or similar approach), but it is not strictly the same as for those proprietary embedded OSes mentioned before […]

2008, Karim Yaghmour, Jon Masters, Gilad Ben-Yossef, Building Embedded Linux Systems:

A policy-created scheduled task will be accepted by computers running client OSes as old as Windows 2000 […]

2010, Jorge Orchilles, Microsoft Windows 7 Administrator's Reference:

In a dual-boot configuration, you install two OSs on the computer (Windows XP and Windows 2000, for example).

2009, Emmett Dulaney, CompTIA A+ Complete Review Guide:

operating system
operating system#English

(software) Initialism of operating system.


clock

en-noun

clock (countable and uncountable, plural clocks)

First use appears c. 1370. Middle English clokke, clok, cloke, from Middle Dutch clocke (“bell, clock”), from Old Dutch *klokka, from Medieval Latin clocca, probably of Celtic origin, from Proto-Celtic *klokkos (“bell”) (compare Welsh cloch, Old Irish cloc), either onomatopoeic or from Proto-Indo-European *klek- (“to laugh, cackle”) (compare Proto-Germanic *hlahjaną (“to laugh”)). Related to Old English clucge, Dutch klok, Saterland Frisian Klokke (“bell; clock”), Low German Klock (“bell, clock”), German Glocke, Swedish klocka Doublet of cloak and cloche.

onomatopoeic

onomatopoeic

сахӏат

instrument to measure or keep track of time

chronometer

instrument used to measure or keep track of time

even a stopped clock is right twice a day

Executing a NEXT to code takes 7 clocks, or 1.05 microseconds.

1984, The Journal of Forth Application and Research, volume 2, page 83:

The best schedule produced by any hardware algorithm takes 7 clocks, whereas the statically reordered code in Figure 1.2(b) takes only 5 clocks.

1990, Joseph F. Traub, Barbara J. Grosz, Annual Review of Computer Science, page 180:

(computing, informal) A CPU clock cycle, or T-state.


OCR

en-noun

OCR (countable and uncountable, plural OCRs)

optical character recognition
optical character recognition#English

(computing, uncountable) Initialism of optical character recognition (the technology or principle).

optical character reader
optical character reader#English

(computing, countable) Initialism of optical character reader (the scanning device).


bit

Coined by John Tukey in 1946 as an abbreviation of binary digit, probably influenced by connotations of “small portion”. First used in print 1948 by Claude Shannon. Compare byte and nybble, with similar food associations.

(mathematics, computing) A binary digit, generally represented as a 1 or 0.

(computing) The smallest unit of storage in a digital computer, consisting of a binary digit.

status bits on IRC

permission bits in a file system

(information theory, cryptography) Any datum that may take on one of exactly two values.

bit

information theory: datum that may take on one of exactly two values

The researchers found that the original texts spanned a variety of entropy values in different languages, reflecting differences in grammar and structure.
But strangely, the difference in entropy between the original, ordered text and the randomly scrambled text was constant across languages. This difference is a way to measure the amount of information encoded in word order, Montemurro says. The amount of information lost when they scrambled the text was about 3.5 bits per word.

2011 May 17, Lisa Grossman, “Entropy Is Universal Rule of Language”, in Wired Science, retrieved 2012-09-26:

(information theory) A unit of measure for information entropy.

bito

information theory: unit of measure for information entropy


BC

BC (countable and uncountable, plural BCs)

This would be a BC-breaking change.

backward compatibility
backward compatibility#English

(software) Initialism of backward compatibility.


point

en-verb

point (third-person singular simple present points, present participle pointing, simple past and past participle pointed)

points (present singular third-person)
pointing (participle present)
pointed (participle past)
pointed (past)

From Middle English pointen, poynten, from Old French pointier, pointer, poynter, from point from Latin pūnctum.

central processing unit
central processing unit

(transitive, computing) To direct the central processing unit to seek information at a certain location in memory.


man

(computing) A command used to display help pages in Unix and Unix-like operating systems.


port

Inherited from the Old English port, from the Latin porta (“passage, gate”), reinforced by the Old French porte. Doublet of porta.

non-rhotic, without the horse–hoarse merger

Computer port
w:Computer port (hardware)

A logical or physical construct in and from which data are transferred. Computer port on Wikipedia.Wikipedia

مَنْفَذ

computing: logical or physical construct into and from which data are transferred

A female connector of an electronic device, into which a cable's male connector can be inserted.

(also networking) A number that delimits a connection for specific processes or parts of a network service.


port

port (third-person singular simple present ports, present participle porting, simple past and past participle ported)

ports (present singular third-person)
porting (participle present)
ported (participle past)
ported (past)

From Old French porter, from Latin portāre (“carry”). Akin to transport, portable.

By its tenth week of release, CPH was the best-selling PC game in America. PlayStation and Xbox ports were already in the works, and there was talk of porting it to Nintendo.

2022, Gabrielle Zevin, Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, Vintage (2023), page 259:

(computing, video games) To adapt, modify, or create a new version of, a program so that it works on a different platform.

كَيَّفَ

computing: to adapt a program so that it works on a different platform


port

Gamers can't wait until a port of the title is released on the new system.

The latest port of the database software is the worst since we made the changeover.

(computing) A program that has been adapted, modified, or recoded so that it works on a different platform from the one for which it was created; the act of this adapting.

sovitus

computing: program adapted to work on a different platform; act of adapting

(computing, BSD) A set of files used to build and install a binary executable file from the source code of an application.


jiffy

Origin unknown; said to have been thieves’ cant for “lightning”. Also formerly written "giffy", to which a connection with gliff has been proposed. As a kind of envelope, a genericization of Jiffy bag.

unk

unknown

The FOR...NEXT loop for TIME increments by STEP 2 (every two jiffies) for two reasons: 1) the printing of 60 jiffies a second is too fast to read, and 2) the printing of each jiffy takes longer than its incrementations; this would delay the loop, so the printing of TIME$ is slower than it should be.

1980, Carroll S. Donahue, Janice K. Enger, PET-CBM Personal Computer Guide, Berkeley, Calif.: Osborne/McGraw-Hill, →OCLC, page 283:

The number of processed packets per round is limited in dependence of the page size. The processed packets are forwarded to a single queue and are processed for the time of two jiffies.

2015, Johanna Ullrich, Edgar R. Weippl, “Protection through Isolation: Virtues and Pitfalls”, in Ryan Ko, Kim-Kwang Raymond Choo, editors, The Cloud Security Ecosystem: Technical, Legal, Business and Management Issues (Syngress Advanced Topics in Information Security), Waltham, Mass.: Syngress, →ISBN, page 135:

(computing) A unit of time defined by the frequency of its basic timer – historically, and by convention, 0.01 of a second, but some computer operating systems use other values.

систе́мный тик

(computing) Unit of time defined by the frequency of its basic timer


language

en-noun

language (countable and uncountable, plural languages)

From Middle English langage, language, from Old French language, from Vulgar Latin *linguāticum, from Latin lingua (“tongue, speech, language”), from Old Latin dingua (“tongue”), from Proto-Indo-European *dn̥ǵʰwéh₂s (“tongue, speech, language”). Doublet of langaj. Displaced native Old English ġeþēode.

der

/ˈlæŋɡwɪd͡ʒ/

[ˈlæŋɡwɪd͡ʒ]

[ˈlæːŋɡwɪd͡ʒ]

[ˈlaŋɡwɪd͡ʒ]

a language is a dialect with an army and navy

language analysis for the determination of origin

In fact pointers are called references in these languages to distinguish them from pointers in languages like C and C++.

2015, Kent D. Lee, Foundations of Programming Languages, →ISBN, page 94:

(computing, countable) A computer language; a machine language.

rekenaartaal

computer language — see also computer language


bot

The goals of IRC bots vary widely, such as automatically kicking other users off or more nefarious things like spamming other IRC users. In this paper, a free standing IRC bot is presented that monitors an IRC channel for commands from a particular user and responds accordingly.

2009, Ryan Farley, Xinyuan Wang, “Roving Bugnet: Distributed Surveillance Threat and Mitigation”, in Dimitris Gritzalis, Javier López, editors, Emerging Challenges for Security, Privacy and Trust: 24th IFIP TC 11 International Information Security Conference, page 42:

He is particularly good at creating web robots, which are also called bots. A bot is software that searches for certain kinds of websites and then automatically does something — good or bad — on each site. Google uses bots to search and index websites.

2009, Richard K. Neumann, Legal Reasoning and Legal Writing: Structure, Strategy, and Style, page 91:

Twitter bots can leverage Twitter′s text message support to allow users to accomplish tasks from their cell phones. You could consider Twitter accounts that are simply an automated import of blog′s RSS feed a Twitter bot.

2010, Dusty Reagan, Twitter Application Development For Dummies, page 59:

Overall, bots—good and bad—are responsible for 52 percent of web traffic, according to a new report by the security firm Imperva, which issues an annual assessment of bot activity online.

2017 January 31, Adrienne LaFrance, “The Internet Is Mostly Bots”, in The Atlantic, retrieved 2021-09-01:

(computing) A piece of software designed to perform a minor but repetitive task automatically or on command, especially when operating with the appearance of a (human) user profile or account.

بُوت

a piece of software for doing repetitive tasks


adverb

From French adverbe, from Latin adverbium, from ad- (“to”) + verbum (“word, verb”), so called because it is used to supplement other words. By surface analysis, ad- + verb.

(programming) In the Raku programming language, a named parameter that modifies the behavior of a routine.


nine

en:High availability#"Nines"
en:Nines (notation)
nine

From Middle English nyne, nine, from Old English nigon (“nine”), from Proto-West Germanic *neun, from Proto-Germanic *newun (“nine”), from Proto-Indo-European *h₁néwn̥ (“nine”). Cognate with Scots neen, nine (“nine”), Saterland Frisian njúgen (“nine”), West Frisian njoggen (“nine”), Dutch negen (“nine”), German Low German negen (“nine”), German neun (“nine”), Danish ni (“nine”), Swedish nio (“nine”), Icelandic níu (“nine”), Gothic 𐌽𐌹𐌿𐌽 (niun, “nine”), Latin novem (“nine”), Ancient Greek ἐννέα (ennéa, “nine”), Sanskrit नवन् (navan, “nine”).

my very educated mother just served us nine pizzas

my very educated mother just served us nine pumpkins

my very excellent mother just served us nine pizzas

nine thousand nine hundred and ninety-nine

They guaranteed that our Web site would have 99.99% uptime, or four nines.

(computing, engineering, usually in the plural) A statistical unit of proportion (of reliability, purity, etc.).


fnord

A neologism from the Principia Discordia popularized in the Illuminatus! trilogy.

metasyntactic variable
metasyntactic variable

(programming) A metasyntactic variable, similar to foo and bar.


jitter

(computing) A program or routine that performs jitting; a just-in-time compiler.


RAM

random-access memory
random access memory#English

(electronics, computing) Acronym of random-access memory.

ՕՀՍ

random access memory — see also random access memory

ΜΤΠ

μνήμη τυχαίας προσπέλασης f (mními tychaías prospélasis)

Coordinate term: PRAM

(computer science) Acronym of random-access machine.


operating system

en-noun

operating system (plural operating systems)

/ˈɒpəˌɹeɪtɪŋ ˌsɪstəm/

/ˈɑpəˌɹeɪtɪŋ ˌsɪstəm/

This operating system enjoys little market share but the software is open source and free, and it performs as just as well as the leading competitor's.

(computing, software) Software that is designed for controlling the allocation and the use of various hardware resources to tasks and remote terminals.

ഓപറേറ്റിങ്ങ് സിസ്റ്റം

ōpaṟēṟṟiṅṅŭ sisṟṟaṁ


DOD

(scrum, software) Initialism of definition of done.


DOS

Alternative form: DoS

denial of service
denial of service#English

(computing, Internet) Initialism of denial of service.


DOS

Coordinate term: CP/M

Next, using your word processor or the DOS text editor, you can edit your AUTOEXEC.BAT file.

1993, Kris A. Jamsa, DOS: The Complete Reference, McGraw–Hill Osborne Media

One way to do that is to turn the PC off and turn it back on again. Then, the PC performs its self-test and boots DOS.

1993, Doug Lowe, The Only DOS Book You'll Ever Need, Mike Murach & Associates Incorporated, →ISBN, page 95:

Disk Operating System
w:Disk Operating System

(computing, historical) Acronym of Disk Operating System, a family of disk-based operating systems.


IME

Japanese IMEs can work with both QWERTY keyboards and Japanese keyboards.

input method editor
input method editor#English

(computing) Initialism of input method editor.


Pythonesque

en-adj

Pythonesque (comparative more Pythonesque, superlative most Pythonesque)

more Pythonesque (comparative)
most Pythonesque (superlative)

The module works by wrapping the C-extended Tkinter module into Pythonesque classes.

2001, Andy Duncan, Sean Hull, Oracle and Open Source: Tools and Applications:

If you want to cut out a third line, you can rewrite the above with a lambda function, which turns four lines into one (how very Pythonesque).

2003, Richard Hightower, Python Programming with the Java Class Libraries:

programming language
programming language

(computing, informal) Typical of, or suited to, the Python programming language.


bank

From Middle English bank (“bank”), banke, from Old French banc (“bench”), from Frankish *bank. Akin to Old English benc (“bench”).

(computing) A contiguous block of memory that is of fixed, hardware-dependent size, but often larger than a page and partitioning the memory such that two distinct banks do not overlap.


open

open (comparative more open or (phonetics) opener, superlative most open or (phonetics) openest)

more open (comparative)
opener (comparative)
most open (superlative)
openest (superlative)

closed-source

antonym(s) of “with a free license and no proprietary components”

Adjective from Middle English open, from Old English open (“open”), from Proto-West Germanic *opan, from Proto-Germanic *upanaz (“open”), from Proto-Indo-European *upo (“up from under, over”).
Cognates
* Scots apen (“open”)
* Saterland Frisian eepen (“open”)
* West Frisian iepen (“open”)
* Dutch open (“open”)
* Low German open, apen (“open”)
* German offen (“open”)
* Danish åben (“open”)
* Swedish öppen (“open”)
* Norwegian Bokmål åpen (“open”)
* Norwegian Nynorsk open (“open”)
* Icelandic opinn (“open”)
 Compare also Latin supinus (“on one's back, supine”), Albanian hap (“to open”). Related to up.
Verb from Middle English openen, from Old English openian (“to open”), from Proto-West Germanic *opanōn, from Proto-Germanic *upanōną (“to raise; lift; open”), from Proto-Germanic *upanaz (“open”, adjective). Cognate with Saterland Frisian eepenje (“to open”), West Frisian iepenje (“to open”), Dutch openen (“to open”), German öffnen (“to open”), Danish åbne (“to open”), Swedish öppna (“to open”), Norwegian Bokmål åpne (“to open”), Norwegian Nynorsk and Icelandic opna (“to open”). Related to English up.
Noun from Middle English open (“an aperture or opening”), from the verb. In the sports sense, however, a shortening of “open competition”.

inh

at church every time the doors swing open

I couldn't save my changes because another user had the same file open.

Able to be used or interacted with in some way.

(computing, not comparable, of a file, document, etc.) In current use; connected to as a resource.

You're getting short of memory because you have too many apps open.

(computing, of a program or application, especially one with a screen-based interface) Running.

Since the launch early last year of […] two Silicon Valley start-ups offering free education through MOOCs, massive open online courses, the ivory towers of academia have been shaken to their foundations. University brands built in some cases over centuries have been forced to contemplate the possibility that information technology will rapidly make their existing business model obsolete.

2013 July 20, “The attack of the MOOCs”, in The Economist, volume 408, number 8845:

(computing, education) Made public, usable with a free licence and without proprietary components.

free

(computing, used before "code") Source code of a computer program that is not within the text of a macro being generated.


open

en-verb

open (third-person singular simple present opens, present participle opening, simple past and past participle opened)

opens (present singular third-person)
opening (participle present)
opened (participle past)
opened (past)
open (infinitive)

I can't open the file because someone else is editing it.

To make or become available for use or interaction.

(computing, transitive, intransitive) To connect to a resource (a file, document, etc.) for viewing or editing.

Click this icon to open Microsoft Word.

(computing, transitive, intransitive) To start running (a program or application, especially one with a screen-based interface).


consensus

en-noun

consensus (countable and uncountable, plural consensuses or consensus)

Borrowed from Latin cōnsēnsus (“agreement, accordance, unanimity”), from cōnsentiō (“feel together; agree”); see consent.

bor

(computing) An agreement on some data value that is needed during computation.


metadata

[ˈmɛɾ.əˌdeɪ.ɾə]

That photo's metadata suggests it was edited using Photoshop.

(computing) Structured information about a file (date created, creator, software used to create, last modified, file format, file fingerprint, etc).


nag screen

LL-Q1860 (eng)-Flame, not lame-nag screen.wav

WinRAR shows a nag screen once its 40-day trial is over to encourage users to buy a license.

The first screen to pop up is the nag screen; be patient, it disappears after 5 seconds. (Have you ever wondered why nag screens are mandatory for shareware?)

1996, New and improved stupid Windows tricks, page 17:

(computing) A message displayed by a nagware program to encourage the user to purchase the full version.


AA

en-noun

AA (countable and uncountable, plural AAs)

(computer graphics) Initialism of antialiasing.


AA

en-verb

AA (third-person singular simple present AAs, present participle AAing, simple past and past participle AAed)

AAs (present singular third-person)
AAing (participle present)
AAed (participle past)
AAed (past)

On the other hand, edge AA in EF2000 didn't make much difference because only the objects were AAed and they made up only a very small percentage of the screen area.

1999 September 12, Darin Genereux, “Re: "Anti-Aliasing vs. More Polygons" teapot page has been UPDATED”, in comp.sys.ibm.pc.hardware.video (Usenet):

Vector images can be considered to have extremely high resolution, so it is possible to AA them.

2003 June 25, Ilari Liusvaara, “Re: I have a Linux Desktop dream, desktoplinux.com”, in comp.os.linux.advocacy (Usenet):

(computer graphics, transitive) Initialism of antialias.


send

From Middle English senden, from Old English sendan (“to send, cause to go”), from Proto-West Germanic *sandijan, from Proto-Germanic *sandijaną, from Proto-Indo-European *sont-eye- (“to cause to go”), causative of *sent- (“to walk, travel”). The noun derives from the verb.
Cognates
Cognate with Saterland Frisian seende (“to send”), Dutch zenden (“to send”), German senden (“to send”), Danish and Norwegian sende (“to send”), Swedish sända (“to send”), Icelandic senda (“to send”). Related also to Old English sand, sond (“a sending, mission, message”). See also sith.

inh

Good thing I didn't hit send on that resume; I just noticed a bad typo.

graphical user interface
graphical user interface

(graphical user interface; often capitalized, or capitalized and put in quotation marks) An icon (usually on a computer screen and labeled with the word "Send") on which one clicks (with a mouse or its equivalent) or taps to transmit an email or other electronic message.


global

en-adj

global (comparative more global, superlative most global)

more global (comparative)
most global (superlative)

domestic

antonym(s) of “concerning all parts of the world”

local

antonym(s) of “of a variable, in computing”

From globe + -al; compare French global.

Global variables keep support engineers employed.

(not comparable) Pertaining to the whole of something; total, universal:

(not comparable, computing) Of a variable, accessible by all parts of a program.

-omfattande (e.g. systemomfattande, programomfattande)


global

(computing) A globally scoped identifier.


world

whirled (with both the wine–whine merger and fern–fir–fur merger)

whorled (with both mergers, Received Pronunciation only)

From Middle English world, weoreld, from Old English weorold (“world”), from Proto-West Germanic *weraldi, from Proto-Germanic *weraldiz (“lifetime, human existence, world”, literally “age/era of man”), equivalent to wer (“man”) + eld (“age”). Superseded Middle English mounde (“world”), from Old French monde, munde (“world”). Cognate with Scots warld (“world”), Saterland Frisian Waareld (“world”), West Frisian wrâld (“world”), Afrikaans wêreld (“world”), Dutch wereld (“world”), Low German Werld (“world”), German Welt (“world”), Norwegian Bokmål verden (“(the) world”), Norwegian Nynorsk verd (“world”), Swedish värld (“world”), Icelandic veröld (“world”).

inh

an eye for an eye makes the whole world blind

have the world by the tail on a downhill pull

the hand that rocks the cradle is the hand that rules the world

the hand that rocks the cradle rules the world

(computing) The part of an operating system distributed with the kernel, consisting of the shell and other programs.


take

en-verb

take (third-person singular simple present takes, present participle taking, simple past took, past participle taken or (archaic or Scotland) tane)

takes (present singular third-person)
taking (participle present)
took (past)
taken (participle past)
tane (Scotland archaic participle past)
take (infinitive)

Brill Publishers
Helmut Rix
Lexikon der indogermanischen Verben

From Middle English taken (“to take, lay hold of, grasp, strike”), from Old English tacan (“to grasp, touch”), of North Germanic origin, from Old Norse taka (“to touch, take”), from Proto-Germanic *tēkaną (“to touch”), from pre-Germanic *deh₁g- (“to touch”), possibly a phonetically altered form of Proto-Indo-European *te-th₂g- (“to touch, take”) (see there for details).
Cognate with Scots tak, Icelandic and Norwegian Nynorsk taka (“to take”), Norwegian Bokmål ta (“to take”), Swedish ta (“to take”), Danish tage (“to take, seize”), Middle Dutch taken (“to grasp”), Dutch taken (“to take; grasp”), Middle Low German tacken (“to grasp”). English thack may be from the same root. Compare tackle. Unrelated to Lithuanian tèkti (“to receive, be granted”), which is instead cognate with English thig.
Gradually displaced Middle English nimen (“to take”; see nim), from Old English niman (“to take”).

unést

to support or carry without failing or breaking

The function takes two arguments, an array of size n and an integer k.

(transitive) To accept as an input to a relation.

(transitive, mathematics, computing) To accept (zero or more arguments).

To accept as an input to a relation.
To accept (zero or more arguments).


sound card

LL-Q1860 (eng)-Flame, not lame-sound card.wav

(computer hardware) A computer hardware device used for generating and capturing sounds.

聲卡 /声卡

a computer hardware device used for generating and capturing sounds


add

From Middle English adden, from Latin addō (“add, give unto”), from ad (“to”) + dō (“give”).

List the number of adds and multiplies for each of the forms (6) , (7), and (8).

2004, C. K. Birdsall, A. B. Langdon, Plasma Physics via Computer Simulation, page 75:

(computer science) An act or instance of adding.


network

Etymology tree
Proto-Indo-European *neHd-
Proto-Indo-European *-yós
Proto-Germanic *natją
Proto-West Germanic *nati
Old English nett
Middle English net
English net
Proto-Indo-European *werǵ-
Proto-Indo-European *-om
Proto-Indo-European *wérǵom
Proto-Germanic *werką
Proto-West Germanic *werk
Old English weorc
Middle English werk
English work
English network
Compound of net + work.

etymon

filtered-popping recursive transition network

The copy machine is connected to the network so it can now serve as a printer.

(computing, Internet) Multiple computers and other devices connected together to share information

netwerk

multiple computers and other devices connected together


wireless

en-noun

wireless (usually uncountable, plural (dated) wirelesses)

If your wireless stops working, try restarting the router.

(uncountable, networking) Wireless connectivity to a computer network.

безжично свързване

wireless connectivity to a computer network


shadowing

shadowing (countable and uncountable, plural shadowings)

(computing) The technique of copying ROM contents to RAM to allow for shorter access times. The ROM chip is then disabled while the initialized memory locations are switched in on the same block of addresses.


CLL

CLL (countable and uncountable, plural CLLs)

(countable, computing) Initialism of command line language.


new

en-verb

new (third-person singular simple present news, present participle newing, simple past and past participle newed)

news (present singular third-person)
newing (participle present)
newed (participle past)
newed (past)

From Middle English newe, from Old English nīewe, from Proto-West Germanic *niwi, from Proto-Germanic *niwjaz, from Proto-Indo-European *néwyos (“new”), from *néwos.
Cognates
Cognate with Scots new (“new”), West Frisian nij (“new”), Dutch nieuw (“new”), Low German nee (“new”), German neu (“new”), Danish, Norwegian and Swedish ny (“new”), Icelandic nýr (“new”), Faroese nýggjur (“new”), Latin novus (“new”), Ancient Greek νέος (néos, “new”), Welsh newydd (“new”), Russian но́вый (nóvyj, “new”), Armenian նոր (nor, “new”), Persian نو (now, “new”),Northern Kurdish nû (“new”), Hindi नया (nayā, “new”), Tocharian B ñuwe (“new”).
Compare also Old English nū (“now”). More at now. Doublet of nuevo and novuss.


feature

→ German: Feature

→ Ukrainian: фі́ча (fíča)

From Middle English feture, from Anglo-Norman feture, from Old French faiture, from Latin factūra, from Latin factus, from Latin faciō (“do, make”), ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *dʰeh₁- (“to put, place, set”). Doublet of facture.

feature

long, prominent article or item in the media

The program contained an internal feature, which allowed a user to update display text after each command keystroke.

(computing) A beneficial capability of a piece of software.

funcionalitat

computing: beneficial capability of a piece of software


automatic

en-adj

automatic (comparative more automatic, superlative most automatic)

more automatic (comparative)
most automatic (superlative)
dubious (superlative)

→ Albanian: automatik

→ Malay: automatik

→ Pohnpeian: audomadik

[ˌɔː.ɾəˈmæɾ.ɪk]

[ˌɑː.ɾəˈmæɾ.ɪk]

[ˌɑː.ɾəˈmæɾ.ɪk]

From French automatique, from Ancient Greek αὐτόματον (autómaton), neuter of αὐτόματος (autómatos, “self-moving, moving of oneself, self-acting, spontaneous”), from αὐτός (autós, “self, myself”) + μέμαα (mémaa, “to wish eagerly, strive, yearn, desire”).

automatik

describing a firearm which fires continuously

(computing, of a local variable) Automatically added to and removed from the stack during the course of function calls.


software

en-noun

software (usually uncountable, plural (nonstandard) softwares)

→ Amharic: ሶፍትዌር (softəwer)

desc

→ Persian: نرمافزار (narm-afzâr) (calque)

From soft + -ware, by contrast with hardware (“the computer itself”). Coined by John Tukey in 1958.

The "software" comprising the carefully planned interpretive routines, compilers, and other aspects of automative programming are at least as important to the modern electronic calculator as its "hardware" of tubes, transistors, wires, tapes and the like.

1958, John W. Tukey, "The Teaching of Concrete Mathematics" in The American Mathematical Monthly, vol. 65, no. 1 (Jan. 1958), pp 1-9

As originally conceived, the word "software" was merely an obvious way to distinguish a program from the computer itself. A program comprised sequences of changeable instructions each having the power to command the behavior of the permanently crafted machinery, the "hardware."

1995, Paul Niquette, Softword: Provenance for the Word ‘Software’:

(computing) Encoded computer instructions, usually modifiable (unless stored in some form of unalterable memory such as ROM).

ໂລຊີຊີແອນ

lō sī sī ʼǣn


offset

From off- + set, used to construct the noun form of the verb to set off. Compare Middle English ofsetten (“to encumber, harass, beset, besiege”), from Old English ofsettan (“to press, oppress, overwhelm, crush”).

cog

An array of bytes uses its index as the offset, of words a multiple thereof.

(programming) The difference between a target memory address and a base address.


abstract

en-verb

abstract (third-person singular simple present abstracts, present participle abstracting, simple past and past participle abstracted)

abstracts (present singular third-person)
abstracting (participle present)
abstracted (participle past)
abstracted (past)
abstract (infinitive)

From Middle English abstract, borrowed from Latin abstractus, perfect passive participle of abstrahō (“draw away”), formed from abs- (“away”) + trahō (“to pull, draw”). The verbal sense is first attested in 1542.

काढून टाकणे

kāḍhūn ṭākṇe

remove

to remove, separate, take away, or withdraw

He abstracted out the square root function.

(transitive) To consider abstractly; to contemplate separately or by itself; to consider theoretically; to look at as a general quality.

(intransitive, computing) To produce an abstraction, usually by refactoring existing code. Generally used with "out".


abstraction

en-noun

abstraction (countable and uncountable, plural abstractions)

From Middle English abstraccyone; either from Middle French abstraction or from Medieval Latin abstrāctiō (“separation”), from Latin abstrahō (“draw away”). Equivalent to abstract + -ion.

der

Files are an abstraction provided by the file system for storing data, so that applications do not have to care how that data is stored.

(computing) Hiding implementation details from the interface of a component, to decrease complexity through interdependency and improve modularity; a construct that serves as such.


accelerator

* First attested in 1611.
* (motor vehicle): First attested in 1900.
* accelerate + -or

a pedal used to control a vehicle's speed

a device that speeds up computer processing

a key which a user can press to activate a menu

If they had allowed single-character accelerators, Windows wouldn't be able to determine whether the character was input or a shortcut.

2002, Davis Howard Chapman, Sams Teach Yourself Visual C++ .NET in 21 Days, page 187:

(computing) A computer component using dedicated hardware to accelerate the processing and display of graphics.


access

en-noun

access (countable and uncountable, plural accesses)

From Middle English accesse, acces, borrowed from Middle French acces (“attack, onslaught”) or from its source Latin accessus, perfect passive participle of accēdō (“approach; accede”), from ad (“to, toward, at”) + cēdō (“move, yield”). Doublet of accessus. First attested in the early 14th century. The sense "entrance" was first attested about 1380.

der

Operations on C++ volatiles do put the compiler on notice that the object may be modified asynchronously, and hence are generally safer to use than ordinary variable accesses.

2011, Victor Pankratius, Ali-Reza Adl-Tabatabai, Walter Tichy, Fundamentals of Multicore Software Development, page 74:

(countable, computing) The process of locating data in memory.

存取

computing: process of locating data in memory

(uncountable, networking) Connection to or communication with a computer program or to the Internet.

toegang

communication with a computer program or the Internet


access

en-verb

access (third-person singular simple present accesses, present participle accessing, simple past and past participle accessed)

accesses (present singular third-person)
accessing (participle present)
accessed (participle past)
accessed (past)

⇒ Brazilian Portuguese: acessar

I can't access most of the data on the computer without a password.

(transitive, computing) To have access to (data).


WYSIWYG

Coined by computer typesetter John W. Seybold and popularized at Xerox PARC during the late 1970s.

coin

WYSIWYGs are helpful tools in that they enable you to create pages much more quickly

2003, James H. Pence, How to Do Everything with HTML & XHTML, page 132:

(computing) Software that allows editing on screen what the printed version would be like; software with a what-you-see-is-what-you-get display interface.

所見即所得 /所见即所得

computer program that allows editing on screen what the printed version would be like

wirklichkeitsgetreue Darstellung auf dem Bildschirm

מה שאתה רואה זה מה שאתה מקבל (informal; there is no formal translation)

ne görüyorsan onu alırsın (informal; there is no formal translation)


accumulator

From Latin accumulātor, agent noun of accumulō (“pile up”), accumulate + -or.

The contents of the memory location and accumulator are NOT altered, but the Negative, Zero and Carry flags are conditioned according to the result of the subtraction.

1986, Jules H. Gilder, Apple IIc and IIe Assembly Language, Springer Science & Business Media, →ISBN, page 139:

The function signature has changed to include the additional parameter accumulator. This parameter, in a way, takes on the job of the return value.

2011, Oliver Sturm, Functional Programming in C#, John Wiley & Sons, →ISBN, page 122:

(programming) A register or variable used for holding the intermediate results of a computation or data transfer.

accumulator

computer science: register for holding intermediate results

(cryptography) A one way membership function.


poison

en-verb

poison (third-person singular simple present poisons, present participle poisoning, simple past and past participle poisoned)

poisons (present singular third-person)
poisoning (participle present)
poisoned (participle past)
poisoned (past)

From Middle English poisoun, poyson, poysone, puyson, puisun, from Old French poison, poisun, from Latin pōtio, pōtiōnis (“drink, a draught, a poisonous draught, a potion”), from pōtō (“I drink”). See also potion and potable (from the same root). Mostly displaced native Old English ātor (see atter).

der

In this technique, the hacker poisons the cache to launch malware into Web pages.

2013, Ronald L. Mendell, Investigating Information-based Crimes, page 93:

(transitive, computing) To place false or malicious data into (a cache, etc.) as part of an exploit.


map

Shortening or back-formation of Middle English mappemounde, mapemounde (“world map”), from Old French mapamonde, from Medieval Latin mappa mundī, compound of Latin mappa (“napkin, cloth”) and mundus (“world”). See mop for more on the first component. Doublet of mop, nape, and nappe.

associative array
associative array#English

(computing) Synonym of associative array.

映射

(computing) associative array — see also associative array


map

en-verb

map (third-person singular simple present maps, present participle mapping, simple past and past participle mapped)

maps (present singular third-person)
mapping (participle present)
mapped (participle past)
mapped (past)

→ Swedish: mappa

картирам

to create a visual representation of a territory

(transitive, computing) To assign a drive letter to a shared folder.


index

en-noun

index (plural indexes or indices or (obsolete, in use in the 17th century) index's)

indexes (plural)
indices (plural)
index's (obsolete plural)

⇒ Chinese: 引得 (yǐndé)

→ Japanese: インデックス (indekkusu)

From Latin index (“a discoverer, informer, spy; of things, an indicator, the forefinger, a title, superscription”), from indicō (“point out, show”); see indicate.

der

(computing, especially programming and databases) An integer or other key indicating the location of data, e.g. within an array, vector, database table, associative array, or hash table.

индекс

programming: key indicating location of data

(computing, databases) A data structure that improves the performance of operations on a table.


index

en-verb

index (third-person singular simple present indexes, present participle indexing, simple past and past participle indexed)

indexes (present singular third-person)
indexing (participle present)
indexed (participle past)
indexed (past)

(computing) To access a value in a data container by an index.


inc

(programming) Abbreviation of increment.


CDC

(computing) Connected Device Configuration.


CDC

change data capture
w:change data capture

(computing) Initialism of change data capture.


BOF

en-noun

BOF (countable and uncountable, plural BOFs)

Coordinate term: EOF

(computing) Initialism of beginning of file.


EOF

EOF (countable and uncountable, plural EOFs)


EOF

Enterprise Objects Framework
w:Enterprise Objects Framework

(computing) Initialism of Enterprise Objects Framework.


data structure

(computer science) Any form of storing and organizing data in a computer so that it can be accessed efficiently.


close

en-verb

close (third-person singular simple present closes, present participle closing, simple past and past participle closed)

closes (present singular third-person)
closing (participle present)
closed (participle past)
closed (past)
close (infinitive)

From Middle English closen (“to close, enclose”), partly continuing (in altered form) earlier Middle English clusen (“to close”) (from Old English clȳsan (“to close, shut”); compare beclose, foreclose, etc.), and partly derived from Middle English clos (“close, shut up, confined, secret”, adjective), from Old French clos (“close, confined”, adjective), from Latin clausus (“shut up”, past participle), from claudere (“to bar, block, close, enclose, bring an end to, confine”), from Proto-Indo-European *kleh₂w- (“key, hook, nail”), related to Latin clāvis (“key, deadbolt, bar”), clāvus (“nail, peg”), claustrum (“bar, bolt, barrier”), claustra (“dam, wall, barricade, stronghold”). Cognate with Ancient Greek κλείς (kleís, “bar, bolt, key”), German schließen (“to close, conclude, lock”), Dutch sluiten (“to close, conclude, lock”). Partially replaced Old English lūcan (“to close, lock, enclose”), (whence English lock). Doublet of clause.

cog

close the stable door after the horse has bolted

Close the file when you have finished reading data.

This app has a bug: when you try to sort a large spreadsheet, it closes.

To make or become non-operational or unavailable for use.

(ergative, computing) To terminate an application, window, file or database connection, etc.


kill

en-verb

kill (third-person singular simple present kills, present participle killing, simple past and past participle killed)

kills (present singular third-person)
killing (participle present)
killed (participle past)
killed (past)
kill (infinitive)

From Middle English killen, kyllen, cüllen (“to strike, beat, cut”), of obscure origin. Cognate with Scots kele, keil (“to kill”).
* Perhaps from Old English *cyllan, from Proto-West Germanic *kwulljan, from Proto-Germanic *kwuljaną, from Proto-Indo-European *gʷelH- (“to throw, hit, hurt by throwing”).
* Or, possibly a variant of Old English cwellan (“to kill, murder, execute”) (see quell).
* Or, from Old Norse kolla (“to hit on the head, harm”), related to Norwegian kylla (“to poll”), Middle Dutch kollen (“to knock down”), Icelandic kollur (“top, head”); see also coll, cole).
Compare also Saterland Frisian källe (“to hurt”), Middle Dutch kellen (“to kill, hurt”), Middle Low German kellen, killen (“to ache strongly, cause one great pain”), Middle High German kellen (“to torment; torture”).

cog

l-vocalizing: UK, General Australian, New Zealand

(computing, Internet, IRC, transitive) To disconnect (a user) involuntarily from the network.


stylus

Borrowed from Latin stylus (“a stake or pale”). Probably not directly related to Ancient Greek στῦλος (stûlos, “a pillar”). Doublet of style.

иго́лка

граммофо́нная

(writing) An ancient writing implement consisting of a small rod with a pointed end for scratching letters on clay, wax-covered tablets or other surfaces, and a blunt end for obliterating them.

(computing) A small device resembling a pen used to input handwritten text or drawings directly into an electronic device with a touch-sensitive screen.

ստիլուս

pen for writing on a touch-sensitive screen


banana

en-noun

banana (countable and uncountable, plural bananas)

Borrowed from Portuguese banana or Spanish banana, derived from a Niger-Congo language spoken in the Guinea region. Specific derivation is unclear. Possible ancestor or cognate languages include Wolof banaana, Eastern Maninkakan banana, and Vai ꕒꘌꕯ (ɓaana) or ꕒꕌꕯ (ɓaana). However, Ay Baati Wolof (Munro & Gaye, 1997) posits that Wolof banaana is itself derived from Portuguese banana.
The racial slur derives from the notion that they are "Yellow (East-Asian) on the outside, White (Westernized) on the inside".

banánový (corresponding to English attributive use)

(corresponding to English attributive use) banánový

(computer science, colloquial) A catamorphism (from the use of banana brackets in the notation).


bomb

en-verb

bomb (third-person singular simple present bombs, present participle bombing, simple past and past participle bombed)

bombs (present singular third-person)
bombing (participle present)
bombed (participle past)
bombed (past)

From French bombe, from Italian bomba, from Latin bombus (“a booming sound”), from Ancient Greek βόμβος (bómbos, “booming, humming, buzzing”), imitative of the sound itself. Doublet of bombe. Compare boom.

onomatopoeic

imitative

When things weren't going Alison's way at work — some editor wanted something changed or her computer bombed again — she'd cuss and yell at whoever happened to be in the way.

2001, Janet Holm McHenry, Girlfriend Gatherings: Creative Ways to Stay Connected, page 28:

(slang)
(intransitive, computing) To crash.


gold

From gold master, a copy of the code certified as being ready for release.

The Company confirmed that Half-Life 2, developed by Valve Software, has gone gold with a planned retail street date of November 16, 2004.

2004 November, “Half-Life 2 goes gold”, in HWM, page 10:

He felt bone-tired and twitchy, the way he did in the final stages of putting a video-game project together, almost ready to go gold and turn a new game loose on the public.

I had coded guilds into M59 over the weekend, shortly before we were supposed to go gold.

2011, Jessica Mulligan, Bridgette Patrovsky, quoting Damion Schubert, Developing Online Games: An Insider's Guide, page 221:

(programming, of software) In a finished state, ready for manufacturing.


ontology

en-noun

ontology (countable and uncountable, plural ontologies)

Learned borrowing from New Latin ontologia (1606, Ogdoas Scholastica, by Jacob Lorhard (Lorhardus), from Ancient Greek ὤν, ὄντος (ṓn, óntos, “being”), present participle of εἰμί (eimí, “being, existing, essence”) + λόγος (lógos, “account”).
First known English use 1663: Archelogia philosophica nova; or, New principles of Philosophy. Containing Philosophy in general, Metaphysicks or Ontology, Dynamilogy or a Discourse of Power, Religio Philosophi or Natural Theology, Physicks or Natural philosophy, by Gideon Harvey (1636–1702), London, Thomson, 1663.
Popularized as a philosophical term by German philosopher Christian Wolff (1679–1754).

der

(countable, computer science, information science) A structure of concepts or entities within a domain, organized by relationships; a system model.


zipper

→ Cebuano: siper

→ Esperanto: zipo

→ French: zipper

→ Japanese: ジッパー (jippā)

→ Korean: 지퍼 (jipeo)

→ Portuguese: zíper

→ Spanish: zíper

→ Tagalog: siper

1925, zip + -er. The trade name was registered in 1925 by B.F. Goodrich for “boots made of rubber and fabric,” claiming use of the name since June 1923. No longer a registered trademark.

(programming) A technique for arbitrarily traversing an aggregate data structure and updating its contents. See zipper (data structure).


write

en-verb

write (third-person singular simple present writes, present participle writing, simple past wrote or (archaic) writ, past participle written or (archaic) writ or (obsolete) ywriten)

writes (present singular third-person)
writing (participle present)
wrote (past)
writ (archaic past)
or (archaic) writ (literary participle past)
ywriten (literary obsolete participle past)
write (infinitive)

From Middle English writen, from Old English wrītan, from Proto-West Germanic *wrītan, from Proto-Germanic *wrītaną (“to carve, write”), from Proto-Indo-European *wrey- (“to rip, tear”).
Cognate with West Frisian write (“to wear by rubbing, rip, tear”), Dutch wrijten (“to argue, quarrel”), Middle Low German wrîten (“to scratch, draw, write”) (> Low German wrieten, rieten (“to tear, split”)), German reißen (“to tear, rip”), Norwegian rita (“to rough-sketch, carve, write”), Swedish rita (“to draw, design, delineate, model”), Icelandic rita (“to cut, scratch, write”), German ritzen (“to carve, scratch”), Proto-Slavic *ryti (“to carve, engrave, dig”), Polish ryć (“to engrave, dig”), Czech rýt (“to engrave, dig”). See also rit and rat.

cog

The computer writes to the disk faster than it reads from it.

(computing, intransitive, with to) To record data mechanically or electronically.

megír

record onto a specific data storage, e.g. DVD


write

How many writes per second can this hard disk handle?

In other words, the system can do 1200 reads per second with no writes, the average write is twice as slow as the average read, and the relationship is linear.

2006, MySQL administrator's guide and language reference, page 393:

(computing) The operation of storing data, as in memory or onto disk.


cast

en-verb

cast (third-person singular simple present casts, present participle casting, simple past and past participle cast or (nonstandard) casted)

casts (present singular third-person)
casting (participle present)
cast (participle past)
cast (past)
casted (nonstandard participle past)
casted (nonstandard past)
cast (infinitive)

New York, New Orleans, Philadelphia, Baltimore

Etymology tree
Proto-Germanic *kas-
Proto-Germanic *kastōną
Old Norse kastabor.
Middle English casten
English cast
From Middle English casten, from Old Norse kasta (“to throw, cast, overturn”), from Proto-Germanic *kastōną (“to throw, cast”), of unknown origin.
Cognate with Scots cast (“to cast, throw”), Danish kaste (“to throw”), Swedish kasta (“to throw, cast, fling, toss, discard”), Icelandic kasta (“to pitch, toss”). In the sense of "flinging", displaced native warp.
The senses relating to broadcasting are based on that same term; compare -cast.

cog

let he who is without sin cast the first stone

let him that is without sin cast the first stone

let him who is without sin cast the first stone

To display a number, you need to cast it to a string type.

(computing) To change a variable type from, for example, integer to real, or integer to text.

强制类型转换

computing: to change the type of a variable


mouse

en-noun

mouse (plural mice or (computing) mouses)

→ Bengali: মাউস (maus)

→ Brazilian Portuguese: mouse

→ French: souris (semantic loan)

→ Georgian: მაუსი (mausi)

→ Italian: mouse

→ Japanese: マウス (mausu)

→ Korean: 마우스 (mauseu)

→ Romanian: mouse

→ Spanish: mouse

desc

→ Thai: เมาส์ (máo), เม้าส์ (máo)

→ Thai: เมาส์ (máo), เม้าส์ (máo)

→ Vietnamese: chuột (semantic loan)

From Middle English mous, from Old English mūs, from Proto-West Germanic *mūs, from Proto-Germanic *mūs, from Proto-Indo-European *múh₂s.
Cognates
Germanic cognates include Old Frisian mūs, Old Saxon mūs (German Low German Muus), Dutch muis, Old High German mūs (German Maus), Old Norse mús (Swedish mus, Danish mus, Norwegian mus, Icelandic mús, Faroese mús).
Indo-European cognates include Ancient Greek μῦς (mûs), Latin mūs, Spanish mur, Armenian մուկ (muk), Old Church Slavonic мꙑшь (myšĭ) (Russian мышь (myšʹ)), Albanian mi, Persian موش (muš),Northern Kurdish mişk,Sanskrit मूष् (mūṣ).
The computing sense was coined by American engineer Bill English in 1965 and first used publicly in a publication titled "Computer-Aided Display Control", in reference to the similarity with the animal.

coin

the best laid plans of mice and men go oft astray

the best laid plans of mice and men often go awry

move the mouse over the icon (that is, move the mouse so that the pointer moves over the icon)

(computing) (plural mice or mouses) An input device that is moved over a pad or other flat surface to produce a corresponding movement of a pointer on a graphical display.

踎士

loaned from English, though more commonly simply written as mouse


mouse

en-verb

mouse (third-person singular simple present mouses, present participle mousing, simple past and past participle moused)

mouses (present singular third-person)
mousing (participle present)
moused (participle past)
moused (past)

I had just moused to the File menu and the pull-down menu repeated the menu bar's hue a dozen shades lighter.

Unlike the Flamenco work, the Relation Browser allows users to quickly explore a document space using dynamic queries issued by mousing over facet elements in the interface.

2009, Daniel Tunkelang, Faceted Search, page 35:

(intransitive, computing) To navigate by means of a computer mouse.


keyboard

(computing, etc.) A set of keys laid out in a grid-like pattern, used for typing on a typewriter, computer etc.

sleutelbord

set of keys used to operate a typewriter, computer etc.


dual

PIE word
 *dwóh₁
Borrowed from Latin dualis (“two”), from duo (“two”) + adjective suffix -alis.

Every category is dual to its own dual, so if a statement holds in all categories so does its dual.

1992, Colin McLarty, Elementary Categories, Elementary Toposes, Clarendon Press, →ISBN, page 77:

(category theory) Being the dual of some other category; containing the same objects but with source and target reversed for all morphisms.


hourglass

Coordinate term: (Apple) beach ball

When I right click the desktop display to check Display Properties, it hangs and shows me only the hourglass instead of the display menu.

(graphical user interface) A cursor, often shaped like an hourglass, indicating that the computer is busy.


morph

morph (third-person singular simple present morphs, present participle morphing, simple past and past participle morphed)

morphs (present singular third-person)
morphing (participle present)
morphed (participle past)
morphed (past)

(colloquial, transitive, intransitive, computer graphics) To change shape, from one form to another, through computer animation.


Hungarian

/hʌŋˈɡɛə.ɹi.ən/

The Hungarian prefix used in this book for a GroupBox control is “grp”.

2009, Michael Ekedahl, Programming with Microsoft Visual Basic 2008:

(computing, programming) Of or relating to Hungarian notation.


Hungarian

en-noun

Hungarian (countable and uncountable, plural Hungarians)

/hʌŋˈɡɛə.ɹi.ən/

The qualifier is the descriptive part of the name that would probably make up the entire name if you weren't using Hungarian.

(uncountable, computing, informal) Hungarian notation.


cube

From Old French cube, from Latin cubus, from Ancient Greek κύβος (kúbos).

(computing) A data structure consisting of a three-dimensional array; a data cube


parallel

From Middle French parallèle, borrowed from Latin parallelus.

Coordinate term: concurrent

a parallel algorithm

(computing) Involving the processing of multiple tasks at the same time.

паралелен

computing: processing multiple tasks at the same time


quine

American Philosophical Association
Epimenides
Kathleen Atkins
The Philosophical Lexicon
indirect self-referencing

From Quine, named after the American logician and philosopher Willard Van Orman Quine (1908–2000).
Verb sense 1 (“to append (a text) to a quotation of itself”) was coined by the American cognitive and computer scientist Douglas Hofstadter (born 1945) in his book Gödel, Escher, Bach: An Eternal Golden Braid (1979; see the quotation), referring to Quine’s study of indirect self-referencing and in particular Quine’s paradox, the following statement that produces a paradox: “‘Yields falsehood when preceded by its quotation’ yields falsehood when preceded by its quotation.” Hofstadter also referred to the concept of noun sense 1 (“program that produces its own source code as output”) in the book, but termed it a self-rep rather than a quine.
Verb sense 2 (“to deny the importance or significance of (something obviously real or important)”) was independently coined by the American cognitive scientist and philosopher Daniel Dennett (1942–2024) in September 1969 in the original version of his work The Philosophical Lexicon: see the 1987 quotation.

coinage

This has been bugging me recently. Any quines or pointers to relevant articles or web pages is appreciated. Thanks!

1996 October 10, John David Regehr, “[A] Quine in C++?”, in comp.lang.misc (Usenet):

Self-reproducing programs are commonly called quines. Do a web search, it should turn up lots of them. There was also a quine thread here in comp.lang.c just days ago, search deja.com (the thread's title was something about self-printing programs, I think).

1999 December 14, Gergo Barany, “CC Hack?”, in comp.lang.c (Usenet):

A quine is a program that can print its own source code. Most quines are notoriously difficult (and fiendish) to write. Perl can cheat, though. :)

2001 July, Clinton Pierce, “Advanced Perl”, in Perl Developer’s Dictionary, Indianapolis, Ind.: Sams Publishing, →ISBN, page 269:

Why have a one-page chapter that doesn't say anything? At the least, you should present a quine program written in pure ISO C (I can send you one if you like); […] you might refer the interested reader to Ken Thompson's ACM lecture or to another good source of quine-related puzzles. Quines *are* a lot of fun, but why waste time with trivial ASCII-based examples when there are much more fundamental ways to create them?

2003 May 6, Arthur J. O’Dwyer, “‘A to Z of C’”, in comp.lang.c (Usenet):

A respectable quine—one that doesn't cheat—is not allowed to do anything as underhand or trivial as seeking the source file on the disk, opening it, and copying (or printing) its contents. Although writing a quine is not always easy, and in fact may seem impossible, it can always be done in any programming language that is Turing complete (see Turing machine), which includes every programming language actually in use.

2004, David [J.] Darling, “quine”, in The Universal Book of Mathematics: From Abracadabra to Zeno’s Paradoxes, Hoboken, N.J.: John Wiley & Sons, →ISBN, page 264, column 2:

SelfGOL can reproduce itself; it can turn other programs into a quine; it can display a scrolling banner; it plays the Game of Life; and it contains no (ordinary) loops, goto statements, or if statements. Control flow is done, well, interestingly.

2005, Simon Cozens, “Fun with Perl”, in Allison Randal, editor, Advanced Perl Programming, 2nd edition, Sebastopol, Calif.: O’Reilly Media, →ISBN, page 260:

Yet from a different perspective, it [the semantics of a program] describes the process of producing this very code; in other words, it is because object- and meta-language interrelate that makes a quine difficult; in less reflective programs, where means and ends are more separate, this difficulty is not so obvious.

2008, Julian Rohrhuber, “Implications of Unfolding”, in Uwe Seifert, Jin-hyun Kim, Anthony Moore, editors, Paradoxes of Interactivity: Perspectives for Media Theory, Human-computer Interaction, and Artistic Investigations, Bielefeld, North Rhine-Westphalia: transcript Verlag, →ISBN, part II (Interplay between Art, Science, and Technology), page 179:

Gee, last time I wrote a quine in Lisp it ended up being kind of difficult …

2009 July 31, Mike Ash, “‘--All You Zombies--’ Title”, in rec.arts.sf.written (Usenet):

The solution is to make a quine that is also a λ-expression (instead of a list of statements). This is possible, thanks to S-expressions. The way the quine works relies on the fact that its code is a list of statements and that the last one can take a list of the previous ones as arguments.

2011, Antoine Amarilli [et al.], “Can Code Polymorphism Limit Information Leakage?”, in Claudio Agostino Ardagna, Jianying Zhou, editors, Information Security Theory and Practice: Security and Privacy of Mobile Devices in Wireless Communication […] (Lecture Notes in Computer Science; 6633), Berlin: Springer, →ISBN, archived from the original on 2022-02-06, section 5 (Can Lisp-like Languages Help?), page 14:

A Quine is a program that prints its own code. Quines exist for any programming language that is Turing complete and it is a common challenge for students to come up with a Quine in their language of choice. The Quine Page provides a comprehensive list of such programs in various languages.

2012, Thomas Meyer, Christian Tschudin, “Robust Network Services with Distributed Code Rewiring”, in Pietro Lio, Dinesh Verma, editors, Biologically Inspired Networking and Sensing: Algorithms and Architectures, Hershey, Pa.: Medical Information Science Reference, IGI Global, →ISBN, section I (New Biologically Inspired Architectures), page 37, column 1:

Upon receiving a "QUINE" request by the client, the server will first send a 01 OK response, and will then provide the client with a quine in the programming language used to implement the server. This quine does not have to be original.

2013 December 8, Brian Hodgert, “‘Mountains will be Mountains’”, in talk.religion.buddhism (Usenet):

(computing) A program that produces its own source code as output.

quine

program that outputs its own source code


symbol

From French symbole, from Latin symbolus, symbolum (“a sign, mark, token, symbol, in Late Latin also a creed”), from Ancient Greek σύμβολον (súmbolon, “a sign by which one infers something; a mark, token, badge, ticket, tally, check, a signal, watchword, outward sign”), from συμβάλλω (sumbállō, “I throw together, dash together, compare, correspond, tally, come to a conclusion”), from σύν (sún, “with, together”) + βάλλω (bállō, “I throw, put”).

der

(programming) An internal identifier used by a debugger to relate parts of the compiled program to the corresponding names in the source code.


polyglot

/ˈpɑlɪˌɡlɑt/

Book of Genesis
Complutensian Polyglot Bible
Targum Onkelos

PIE word
 *glōgʰs
Borrowed from Attic Greek πολύγλωττος (polúglōttos, “speaking many languages, multilingual”), alternative form of Ancient Greek πολῠ́γλωσσος (polŭ́glōssos, “speaking many languages, multilingual”), from πολῠ́ς (polŭ́s, “a lot of, many”) (ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *pleh₁- (“to fill”)) + Attic Greek γλῶττα (glôtta), Ancient Greek γλῶσσᾰ (glôssă, “tongue; language”) (ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *glōgʰs (“tip of corn”)) + -ος (-os, suffix forming o-grade action nouns). The English word is analysable as poly- + -glot.
Noun sense 1 (“publication in several languages”) is probably derived from Late Latin polyglottus, from Attic Greek πολύγλωττος (polúglōttos): see above.

der

πολῠ́γλωσσος

If you are interested in polyglot file formats, take a look at the polyglot web page in the Corkami wiki. There are various example polyglots, including a PDF file that is also a valid HTML file with JavaScript, as well as a valid Windows PE executable.

2015, Joxean Koret, Elias Bachaalany, “Evading Scanners”, in The Antivirus Hacker’s Handbook, Indianapolis, Ind.: John Wiley & Sons, →ISBN, part II (Antivirus Software Evasion), page 148:

A file that can be interpreted validly as multiple formats.

(programming) A program written to be valid in multiple programming languages.


tick

From Middle English *tik, tek, tyche (“light touch, tap”), from the verb (see Etymology 3 below). Compare Dutch tik (“a pat, tap”), Middle High German zic (“a slight touch”).

cog

(computing) A jiffy (unit of time defined by basic timer frequency).


sieve

From Middle English sive, syfe, from Old English sife, from Proto-West Germanic *sibi (“sieve”), from Proto-Indo-European *seyp-, *seyb- (“to pour, sieve, strain, run, drip”). Akin to German Sieb, Dutch zeef, Proto-Slavic *sito (Russian си́то (síto), сев (sev), се́ять (séjatʹ)).

(category theory) A collection of morphisms in a category whose codomain is a certain fixed object of that category, which collection is closed under precomposition by any morphism in the category.


Unicode

Published as a draft proposal in 1988, “intended to suggest a unique, unified, universal encoding”. From uni- + code.

This character isn't in Unicode.

(international standards, computing) A series of character encoding standards intended to support the characters used by a large number of the world’s languages.

convert to Unicode

(computing) The Unicode standards, together with standards for representing character strings as byte strings.


Unicode

Since most users on the site are westerners, we have banned Unicode in all text input boxes.

(computing, by extension, informal) Characters from a contextually different script, often used in a nonstandard fashion. Sometimes used as an antonym to the characters of the Latin alphabet.


slashdot

en-verb

slashdot (third-person singular simple present slashdots, present participle slashdotting, simple past and past participle slashdotted)

slashdots (present singular third-person)
slashdotting (participle present)
slashdotted (participle past)
slashdotted (past)

After Slashdot, a site that commonly links to other, smaller sites.

2002, Shelley Powers et al., Unix Power Tools http://books.google.com/books?vid=ISBN0596003307&id=t295L6vYuUkC&pg=PA501&lpg=PA501&dq=slashdotted&sig=rF5IZDXp33wnnsgkRIC5niMtqHM
If these numbers are significantly higher than normal usage, something is amiss (perhaps your web server has been slashdotted).

[2003], 2006 Matthew Strebe, The Best of SlashNOT, 2002–2005 http://books.google.com/books?vid=ISBN0595383157&id=skVK4smqz8UC&pg=PA99&lpg=PA99&dq=slashdotted&sig=z6LagXUGvJ09gG77HdLoLSEnFAk
And that guy is supposed to be thrilled to lose both his inbound and outbound connections and e-mail for the joy of having been slashdotted.

2005, Ivan Ristic, Apache Security http://books.google.com/books?vid=ISBN0596007248&id=5yiULnTkN6oC&pg=PA115&lpg=PA115&dq=slashdotted&sig=_zJmLeVMfDyEAAt8FhAl6NZcrVA
Sites that have been slashdotted report traffic between several hundred and several thousand hits per minute.

2005, Charles Stross, Accelerando https://web.archive.org/web/20080519054317/http://www.accelerando.org/_static/accelerando.html
Oh shit, thinks Manfred, better buy some more server time. He can recognize the signs: He's about to be slashdotted.

(computing, Internet, dated) To render a website slow or unusable via the unusually large number of page requests that result from a link on a very popular web site.


picture

Krio: pikchɔ

→ Welsh: pictiwr

/ˈpɪt͡ʃə(ɹ)/

From Middle English pycture, from Old French picture, itself from Latin pictūra (“the art of painting, a painting”), from pingō (“I paint”). Doublet of pictura.

der

The COBOL restriction for the currency symbol in a picture string to be replaced by a single character currency symbol is a compromise solution.

1997, John Barnes, Ada 95 Rationale: The Language - The Standard Libraries, page 390:

To recapitulate, the pictures we have considered so far are: X – any character A — alphabetic characters and the space character […]

1997, Roger Hutty, Mary Spence, Mastering COBOL Programming, page 20:

(programming) A format string in the COBOL programming language.


tree

Jamaican Creole: chrii

[t̠͡ɹ̠̊˔ʷiː]

From Middle English tre, tree, treo, treou, trew, trow, from Old English trēo, trēow (“tree, wood, timber, beam, log, stake, stick, grove, cross, rood”), from Proto-West Germanic *treu, from Proto-Germanic *trewą (“tree, wood”), from pre-Germanic *dréwom, thematic e-grade derivative of Proto-Indo-European *dóru (“tree”). Eclipsed alternative terms for tree in Middle English: Middle English beem, from Old English bēam (see beam) and Middle English arbre, from Old French arbre.
Cognates
From the same Proto-Indo-European: Scots tree (“wood, rod, stick”), North Frisian tre, trä (“tree”), Middle Dutch tree > Dutch teer (“tree”), Danish træ (“tree”), Swedish trä (“wood”), träd (“tree”), Norwegian tre (“tree”), Icelandic tré (“tree”), Gothic 𐍄𐍂𐌹𐌿 (triu, “tree, wood, piece of wood”), Sanskrit दारु (dāru, “tree, wood”), Albanian dru (“tree, wood”), Welsh dâr (“oaks”), Ancient Greek δόρυ (dóru, “wood, spear”), Russian де́рево (dérevo) or дре́во (drévo), Tocharian A or. Related to tar, true.

cog

fall out of the ugly tree and hit every branch

the apple does not fall far from the tree

the apple doesn't fall far from the tree

(computing theory) A recursive data structure in which each node has zero or more nodes as children.

ծառ

(computing theory) recursive data structure

We’ll show it as a tree list.

(graphical user interface) A display or listing of entries or elements such that there are primary and secondary entries shown, usually linked by drawn lines or by indenting to the right.


VB

(computer languages) Initialism of Visual Basic


adjunct

/ˈæd͡ʒ.ʌŋkt/

From Latin adiunctus, perfect passive participle of adiungō (“join to”), from ad + iungō (“join”). Doublet of adjoint.

(category theory) One of a pair of morphisms which relate to each other through a pair of adjoint functors.


concrete

en-adj

concrete (comparative concreter, superlative concretest)

concreter (comparative)
concretest (superlative)

Borrowed from Latin concrētus, past participle of concrescō (to curdle) from con- (with, together) + crescō (to grow, rise).

(category theory, of a category) Analogous to the categories of algebraic objects which category theory was created to generalize, in the sense of having objects which can be thought of as sets equipped with some additional structure. Formally, equipped with a faithful functor to the category of sets.


imperative

imperative (comparative more imperative, superlative most imperative)

more imperative (comparative)
most imperative (superlative)

(computing theory) Having semantics that incorporates mutable variables.

imperatiivinen

computing: having semantics that incorporates mutable variables


case

→ Swedish: case n

From Middle English cas, from Old French cas (“an event”), from Latin cāsus (“a falling, a fall; accident, event, occurrence; occasion, opportunity; noun case”), perfect passive participle of cadō (“to fall, to drop”).

der

Place a break statement at the end of every case to prevent case fall-through.

Execution does not automatically stop at the next case.

2011, Stephen Prata, C++ Primer Plus, page 275:

(programming) A section of code representing one of the actions of a conditional switch.


future

en-noun

future (countable and uncountable, plural futures)

From Middle English future, futur, from Old French futur, from Latin futūrus, irregular future active participle of sum (“I am”), from Proto-Indo-European *bʰuH- (“to become, be”). Cognate with Old English bēo (“I become, I will be, I am”). More at be. Displaced native Old English tōweard and Middle English afterhede (“future”, literally “afterhood”) in the given sense.

noncog

(computing, programming) An object that retrieves the value of a promise.


conditional

From French conditionnel, from Old French condicionel, equivalent to condition + -al.

if and while are conditionals in some programming languages.

(programming) An instruction that branches depending on the truth of a condition at that point.


PVC

en-noun

PVC (countable and uncountable, plural PVCs)

(networking) Initialism of permanent virtual circuit.


POW

(cryptography, cryptocurrencies) Alternative letter-case form of PoW (“proof of work”)


quarantine

quarantine (countable and uncountable, plural quarantines)

Cuban Missile Crisis
Franklin Delano Roosevelt
John Fitzgerald Kennedy
Louis IX of France
quarantine

From Medieval Latin quarentena and quarentīna (“40-day period, Lent”) via Middle English quarentine, Norman quarenteine, French quarenteine, and Italian quarantina, via proposed Late Latin *quaranta + -ēna (forming distributive adjectives), from Latin quadrāgintā (“four tens, 40”). Doublet of carene and quadragene.
In reference to French politics, calque of French quarantaine after edicts of Louis IX. In reference to a severance of political relations, popularized by the Roosevelt administration's 1937 approach to the Axis powers and the later Kennedy administration's 1962 approach to Cuba during the missile crisis.

kwarantyn

(figurative) any rigorously enforced isolation

Also included is Canary, a ‘quarantine’ program for use as a sample to test for a virus by pairing it with new or suspect programs.

At least one expert says... that a quarantine can be futile if the software is infected with a time-activated virus.

(computing, figurative) An isolation of one program, drive, computer, etc. from the rest of a computer network to limit the damage from a bug, computer virus, etc..

If they click on the link then they're added to your approved senders list and their message is moved to your inbox; if they don't, the message stays in quarantine.

(computing, figurative) The program, drive, computer, etc. thus isolated.