Link
Pronunciation
- IPA: /lɪŋk/
- Rhymes: -ɪŋk
Origin 1
From Old English linke probably from Old Norse *hlenkr, from Proto-Germanic. Used in English since the 14th century.
Full definition of link
Noun
link
(plural links)- A connection between places, people, events, things, or ideas.The mayor’s assistant serves as the link to the media.
- CowperThe link of brotherhood, by which
One common Maker bound me to the kind. - GascoigneAnd so by double links enchained themselves in lover's life.
- One element of a chain or other connected series.The third link of the silver chain needs to be resoldered.The weakest link.
- Abbreviation of hyperlinkThe link on the page points to the sports scores.
- (computing) The connection between buses or systems.A by-N-link is composed of N lanes.
- (mathematics) A space comprising one or more disjoint knots.
- (Sussex) a thin wild bank of land splitting two cultivated patches and often linking two hills.
- 2008, Richard John King, A Handbook for Travellers in Kent and SussexThey used formerly to live in caves or huts dug into the side of a bank or "link," and lined with heath or straw.
- (figurative) an individual person or element in a system
- 2010, James O. Young, My Sheep Know My Voice: anointed poetry, AuthorHouse, page 32:But know that God is the strongest link.
- 2010, William Lidwell, Kritina Holden, Jill Butler, Universal Principles of Design, RockPort, page 262:The fuse is the weakest link in the system. As such, the fuse is also the most valuable link in the system.
- 2010, Stephen Fairweather, The Missing Book of Genesis, AuthorHouse, page 219:.... This is so that nobody can change the way every link must talk about the formula that I taught to make a real Chain of Universal Love and not a Chain of Love of a group or sect.â€
- Anything doubled and closed like a link of a chain.a link of horsehair
- (kinematics) Any one of the several elementary pieces of a mechanism, such as the fixed frame, or a rod, wheel, mass of confined liquid, etc., by which relative motion of other parts is produced and constrained.
- (engineering) Any intermediate rod or piece for transmitting force or motion, especially a short connecting rod with a bearing at each end; specifically (in steam engines) the slotted bar, or connecting piece, to the opposite ends of which the eccentric rods are jointed, and by means of which the movement of the valve is varied, in a link motion.
- (surveying) The length of one joint of Gunter's chain, being the hundredth part of it, or 7.92 inches, the chain being 66 feet in length.
- (chemistry) A bond of affinity, or a unit of valence between atoms; applied to a unit of chemical force or attraction.
Holonyms
Derived terms
- (connection) cufflink, hyperlink, linkage, link farm, missing link
- (element of a chain) sausage link
- link-up
- chainlink
Verb
- (transitive) To connect two or more things.
- EustaceAll the tribes and nations that composed it Roman Empire were linked together, not only by the same laws and the same government, but by all the facilities of commodious intercourse, and of frequent communication.
- (intransitive, of a Web page) To contain a hyperlink to another page.My homepage links to my wife's.
- (transitive, Internet) To supply (somebody) with a hyperlink; to direct by means of a link.Haven't you seen his Web site? I'll link you to it.
- (transitive, Internet) To post a hyperlink to.Stop linking those unfunny comics all the time!
- (transitive) To demonstrate a correlation between two things.
Derived terms
Origin 2
Plausibly a modification of Medieval Latin linchinus ("candle"), an alteration of Latin lynchinus, itself from Ancient Greek λÏχνος (lukhnos, "lamp").
Noun
link
(plural links)- (obsolete) A torch, used to light dark streets.
- 1883, Robert Louis Stevenson, Treasure Island"Give me a loan of the link, Dick."
Origin 3
Origin unknown.