Offset
Full definition of offset
Noun
offset
(plural offsets)- Anything that acts as counterbalance; a compensating equivalent.Today's victory was an offset to yesterday's defeat.
- (international trade) A form of countertrade arrangement, in which the seller agrees to purchase within a set time frame products of a certain value from the buying country. This kind of agreement may be used in large international public sector contracts such as arms sales.
- (obsolete, c. 1555) A time at which something begins; outset.
- A printing method, in which ink is carried from a metal plate to a rubber blanket and from there to the printing surface.
- (programming) The difference between a target memory address and a base address.An array of bytes uses its index as the offset, of words a multiple thereof.
- (signal analysis) The displacement between the base level of a measurement and the signal's real base level.The raw signal data was subjected to a baseline correction process to subtract the sensor's offset and drift variations.
- The distance by which one thing is out of alignment with another.There is a small offset between the switch and the indicator which some users found confusing.
- (surveying) A short distance measured at right angles from a line actually run to some point in an irregular boundary, or to some object.
- An abrupt bend in an object, such as a rod, by which one part is turned aside out of line, but nearly parallel, with the rest; the part thus bent aside.
- (botany) A short prostrate shoot that takes root and produces a tuft of leaves, etc.
- A spur from a range of hills or mountains.
- (architecture) A horizontal ledge on the face of a wall, formed by a diminution of its thickness, or by the weathering or upper surface of a part built out from it; a set-off.
Verb
- To compensate for something.I'll offset the time difference locally.to offset one charge against another
- To form an offset in (a wall, rod, pipe, etc.).