delete
/dɪˈliːt/
Word Rarity
Uncommon
Frequency: Zipf frequency 4.22 in modern English
7
Scrabble Score
6
Letters
2
Syllables
4
Unique Chars
Meaning
verb
To remove, get rid of or erase, especially written or printed material, or data on a computer or other device.
Transitive verb
noun
A deletion.
noun
The delete character (U+007F or %7F).
Example Sentences
- "Early on in the model year [1968] Pontiac experienced some production problems [in producing polyurethane bumpers] regarding fit, matching paint color, and bonding the material to the base metal. As a result, 2,108 1968 GTOs left the factory with chrome bumpers borrowed from the LeMans. These cars had a special option on their order sheets called "Endura bumper delete." Everyone wanted the Endura bumpers and no one ordered that option of his or her own free will. As soon as Pontiac worked out the production problems the chrome bumpers disappeared for good and "Endura bumper delete" disappeared from the option list."
- "Also I got deleted by a rogue and druid who were both invisible and just popped up and cleaned me."
- ""Go find this guy, Alex," Conch had said. "And delete him.""
- ""[…]The less we discover about him, the more we are convinced he needs to be deleted..." […] "Yes. In other words I kill a terrorist, right?""
- "I'm a forty-something psychopath who thinks he has the right to delete anyone he sees fit."
- "She either felt pity for him and put him out of pain, a ridiculous, untrue solution for pity and sorrow are delusions, or she was part of his triangle had to delete him before he spoke again, he had to be silenced."
Etymology
From Latin dēlētus, past participle of dēlēre (“destroy, blot out, efface”), from dēlēvī, originally perf. tense of dēlinere (“to daub, erase by smudging”), from dē- (“from, away”) + linere (“to smear, wipe”). Original sense first appears c. 1495. In common use for ordering the absence of features of products (such as automobiles) in the 1960s. The computing sense, including the noun form, first appears c. 1977 in Software: Practice & Experience. Not related to deleterious. Doublet of delible and deleble.
Origin
- Source language: Latin
Word Breakdown
- Root: *h₂leyH-, dēlētus