coden.
/kəʊd/, U.S. /koʊd/ I. A collection of laws, rules, writings, etc.† 3. A collection of writings forming a book, such as the Old or the New Testament. Also: a recognized division or volume of such a book. Obsolete.
1. A systematic collection or digest of laws, esp. those of a country, or those relating to a particular subject; spec. (Roman Law) any of the various systematic collections of statutes made by or for later emperors, esp. Justinian (527–65) (now historical).Cf. Napoleonic code n. at Napoleonic adj. Compounds, penal code n. at penal adj.1 and n. Compounds, etc.
ΘΚΠ
society > law > written law > [noun] > code of laws
codea1387
codies?a1500
codex1577
capitular1585
capitulary1618
society > law > written law > [noun] > code of laws > code of Roman law
codea1387
digesta1387
pandect1531
codice1564
codex1577
basilics1728
basilica-
a1387 J. Trevisa tr. R. Higden Polychron. (St. John's Cambr.) (1871) III. 255 (MED) Theodocius iunior made a book of lawe þat is i-cleped Theodocius his code [L. codicem].
a1400 (c1303) R. Mannyng Handlyng Synne (Harl.) l. 2183 Þat mayst þou fynde al and sum In code ‘de raptu virginum.’
a1464 J. Capgrave Abbreuiacion of Cron. (Cambr. Gg.4.12) (1983) 71 This emperour [sc. Justiniane] mad many lawes, both þe digest and þe code.
1542 T. Elyot Bibliotheca Exconsules, & Exquestores, rehersed in the Code of ciuile lawe do signifie..they whiche are or haue bene in the dignytie of Consul or Quaestor.
1577 H. I. tr. H. Bullinger 50 Godlie Serm. II. iii. viii. sig. Mm.ii/2 The lawes and constitutions..found either in the Code, in the booke of Digestes, or Pandectes.
1656 T. Blount Glossographia Code, a Volume conteining divers books; more particularly a Volume of the Civil Law so called, which was reduced into one Code, or Codice, by Justinian.
1735 A. Pope Satires of Donne ii, in Wks. II. 96 Larger far Than Civil Codes, with all their glosses, are.
1771 ‘Junius’ Stat Nominis Umbra (1772) II. xliv. 159 There is no code, in which we can study the law of parliament.
1818 W. Cruise Digest Laws Eng. Real Prop. (ed. 2) I. 2 The different German tribes were first governed by codes of laws formed by their respective chiefs.
1861 Ld. Brougham Brit. Constit. (ed. 2) xix. 301 Every government is bound to digest the whole of the law into a code.
1990 N. Baker Room Temperature (1991) ix. 73 A rival scholar, Odofred, was occupied with a redaction of the extant version of the Code of Justinian.
2019 Peace Arch News (Brit. Columbia) (Nexis) 14 July The..School District's decision violates teaching standards, the Human Rights Code,..and the 2006 Supreme Court Hewko decision.
2.
a. A system or collection of rules or regulations on any subject. In extended use: any (unwritten) set of principles, conventions, or expectations governing a person's behaviour, etc., generally accepted by a society or group. Cf. Phrases 1, (up) to code at Phrases 3.Sometimes spec. (with capital initial) = Hays code at Hays n. (cf. quot. 1956).Cf. dress code n. at dress n. Compounds 1c, schoolboy code n. at schoolboy n. Compounds 3, etc. [In quot. 1548 code does not render a corresponding word in the Latin original.]
ΘΚΠ
the world > action or operation > behaviour > a standard of conduct > [noun] > prescribed rule of conduct > system of
code1548
protocol1915
society > authority > control > [noun] > regulation > a regulation or rule > body or system of
disciplinea1393
formulary?1541
code1548
codex1577
rationale1580
disciplizationa1706
regimen1751
code of practice1783
1548 N. Udall et al. tr. Erasmus Paraphr. Newe Test. I. Mark iv. f. xxiijv By this darke parable, the Lorde couertly taught his disciples the begynnyng, goyng forwarde, and consummacion or perfit code of al ye whole gospell.
1665 E. Waterhouse Gentlemans Monitor xxxix. 361 Why should our neighbours give us the Standard of breeding, and the code of Fashion.
1783 W. Hutton Hist. Birmingham (ed. 2) 125 There is nothing which continues in the same state: the code of manners, habits of thinking, and of expression, modes of living, [etc.].
1809 S. T. Coleridge Friend 30 Nov. 227 In the legislative as in the religious Code.
1841–8 F. Myers Catholic Thoughts II. iv. xxiv. 298 Christianity can never be reduced to a mere code of Ethics.
1875 H. E. Manning Internal Mission of Holy Ghost xiii. 352 The Sermon on the Mount contains the whole code of perfection.
1927 F. M. Thrasher Gang iii. xv. 288 Loyalty is a universal requirement in the gang, and squealing is probably the worst infraction of the code.
1956 G. Seldes Public Arts iii. 21 Several scenes..were so deftly done that no one could think of them as evasions of the Code.
a1991 D. M. Nelson Anat. Game (1994) viii. 167 Recently the NCAA Football Rules Committee has distributed embossed plaques and posters of the code to all football-playing institutions, with mixed results.
2019 i-Independent (Nexis) 30 July 37 The elite is..a club governed by invisible, unspoken social codes that dictate how we speak, dress, greet each other and introduce ourselves.
b. An authoritative or official list of approved drugs with their uses and formulations; a pharmacopoeia. Cf. codex n. 3. rare. Now historical.Used chiefly with reference to the French and other European pharmacopoeias.
ΘΚΠ
the world > health and disease > healing > pharmacy > [noun] > pharmacopoeia
dispensatory1566
pharmacopoeia1618
receipt book1647
dispensary1721
formulary1823
code1846
B.P.1898
U.S.P.1909
1846 tr. A. A. da Silveira Pinto in Pharmaceut. Jrnl. & Trans. 5 477 (title) The Portuguese Pharmaceutical Code [Port. Codigo Pharmaceutico Lusitano], or Treatise on Pharmaconomia.
1947 Bull. Pan Amer. Union 81 176/2 The French Pharmaceutical Code has been adopted by Uruguay as its own official pharmacopoeia.
2020 L. Shiner Art Scents v. 93 By 1818, the official French pharmaceutical code had embraced the chemists' demonstration of the ineffectiveness of perfumes or incense for getting rid of obnoxious smells.
c. A distinct form of a particular type of sport, with its own specific system of rules; esp. any of the various versions of football, such as rugby union, rugby league, Australian Rules football, Association Football, etc. (cf. football n. I.).
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society > leisure > sport > [noun] > type
code?1874
contact sport1949
?1874 C. W. Alcock Football: our Winter Game vii. 95 Briefly summarised the game of football may practically be divided into two representative codes, ‘wide as poles asunder’... The world of football is resolved into those who play the game promoted by the Football Association, and those who adopt the Rugby game.
1904 Leader (Dublin) 12 Mar. 43/1 I have played each of the three codes—Gaelic, Rugby and Association—for years.
1995 Herald (Glasgow) (Nexis) 28 Aug. 7 Middlesex, who are going so well in the [cricket] county championship, continue to struggle when it comes to the one-day code.
2013 London Evening Standard (Nexis) 18 Oct. (Sport section) 73 (header) Gareth Thomas on..whether—having played both codes—he prefers union or league.
ΘΚΠ
society > communication > book > matter of book > [noun] > main subdivision of large work
bookOE
tome1519
volume1523
code1607
society > leisure > the arts > literature > a written composition > a compilation > [noun] > collection forming book
code1607
1607 T. Ridley View Civile & Eccl. Law 30 The first Booke of the Code treateth of Religion, and the Rites & Ceremonies thereto belonging.
1701 N. Grew Cosmol. Sacra iv. i. §13 Then having learned the Hebrew Tongue, and procured a Copy of the Hebrew Code.
1736 N. Bailey et al. Dictionarium Britannicum (ed. 2) Code, a Volume or Book.
1794 W. Paley View Evidences Christianity I. i. ix. §3 The Christian scriptures were divided into two codes or volumes.
1794 W. Paley View Evidences Christianity I. i. ix. 288 Intending by the one a code or collection of Christian sacred writings, as the other expressed the code or collection of Jewish sacred writings.
1821 T. H. Horne Introd. Crit. Study Holy Script. II. (ed. 2) ii. ii. 259 His [sc. Matthew's] Gospel is uniformly placed first in all the codes or volumes of the Gospels.
II. A system of signs or symbols.
4.
a. Originally: (a collection of regulations setting out) a system of military, naval, or maritime signals (as a contextual use of sense 2a). In later use: any system by which information or instructions are conveyed concisely according to a set of previously agreed correspondences between words, symbols, sequences of numbers, or actions and the words or meaning to be understood, sometimes with the aim that this should be intelligible only to the intended recipient; esp. (now chiefly historical) such a system used for economy or secrecy in the transmission of telegraphic messages.The use of printed lists of words taken from dictionaries or of artificial groups of letters or numbers, alongside the corresponding words, phrases, or sentences, was introduced for semaphore telegraphy in the late 18th cent., and adopted for electric telegraphy in the mid 19th cent.international code n., signal code n.: see the first element. See also handkerchief code n.
ΘΚΠ
society > armed hostility > military organization > signals > [noun] > system of
code1783
1783 W. Graves Two Lett. (new ed.) i. 20 (note) The admiral afterwards formed a special signal for this purpose and delivered it out in orders, in addition to the standing code of signals.
1808 Duke of Wellington Dispatches (1837) IV. 21 A long letter respecting..a code of signals for the army.
1853 Hunt's Yachting Mag. June 160 The Quarantine flag or Yellow Jack..is not at all required in the code itself.
1862 ‘The Druid’ Scott & Sebright iii. 171 He was obliged to employ a code of stick and hand signals to the boy.
1910 J. Evers Baseball in Big Leagues viii. 127 The commonest code is one finger in various positions for a straight ball..and the palm out if he wants a ‘pitch out’.
1928 W. F. Friedman Rep. Hist. Use Codes & Code Lang. (Internat. Radiotelegr. Conf. 1927) 25 For example, the root ‘APARL’ in a certain code meant ‘We order 1500 at 28 shillings’.
1952 A. M. Duncan-Kemp Where Strange Paths go Down 11 Smoke signals, the bush telegraph which relays in some intricate secret code, tribal news to the outside world.
1999 S. Singh Code Bk. i. 31 At first sight, codes seem to offer more security than ciphers, because words are much less vulnerable to frequency analysis than letters.
2003 Metrop. Mus. Art Bull. 60 19/1 There are several ways of blazoning an armorial accurately. One is by means of a code of directional lines and dots representing the tinctures and metals of the shield.
b. A method of communication in which each letter (or group of letters) in a written message is systematically substituted by another, or by a symbol, to enable transmission (e.g. in a semaphore alphabet or by electrical telegraphy). Also: any system of cryptography in which such substitution is used for secrecy; a cipher.In technical use in cryptography, such a system is often distinguished as a cipher (cf. cipher n. 5a), the term code being used in sense 4a. It can range from the simple substitution of letters to the use of complex mathematical algorithms.See also Morse code n. at Morse n.3 2c.
ΘΚΠ
the mind > mental capacity > knowledge > secrecy, concealment > code, cipher > [noun]
cipher1528
steganography1569
polygraphy1593
jargon1594
cryptography1653
code1818
code language1875
1818 J. Dennis Addr. to Comm. for Relief Distressed Seamen (ed. 2) 48 A very ingenious Telegraphist, Mr. Connolly, has invented a code by which every word is literally spelt.
1870 Poles, Wires, & Cables 18 For some time past the authorities have been striving to devise a ‘code’ or ‘cipher’, by which some of the public may fancy that they can communicate with secrecy.
1927 Daily Express 24 Nov. 13 The most simple code is the ‘monoalphabetic’, in which a letter is always represented by the same sign, letter, or numeral.
1993 M. A. Winzer Hist. Special Educ. vi. 209 After halving the number of dots, Braille then devised a new code, alphabetic rather than phonetic, employing combinations of six dots.
1993 New Scientist 6 Mar. 44/1 The codebreakers at Bletchley cracked the Enigma and Fish codes with the help of Colossus, the world's first electronic programmable computer.
2007 C. Stross Halting State (2008) 244 OTP [= one-time pad] codes are great—they're totally unbreakable if you don't have a copy of the key—but they've got a big draw-back: you need a copy of the key, a long sequence of random numbers, at each end-point.
5.
a. Language used to express another meaning in an indirect and often deliberately euphemistic way; an instance of this. Frequently with for.Earliest in in code (see Phrases 2b).
ΚΠ
1929 Amer. Speech 5 45 These jargons all have the same purpose: to exclude the uninitiate, and to provide a simple means for the exchange of ideas among the members of the craft. Craft slang is speaking in code.
1977 Med. Jrnl. Austral. 27 Aug. 270/2 ‘Success rates of up to 80% have been achieved’ is code for ‘usually we achieve 40%’.
1992 N.Y. Times 19 July iv. 17/1 Sometimes he backs free trade; sometimes ‘fair trade’, a code for protectionism.
2017 Daily Tel. (Nexis) 18 Nov. (Saturday Mag.) 5 She was wearing a ‘figure-hugging’ dress... Figurehugging [sic], as I don't need to tell you, is code for looking a bit fat.
b. Linguistics. A language, or a particular dialect or register of a language. Cf. code-switching n.
ΚΠ
1952 Language 28 113 The study of the intentive and interpretative behavior lies in the province of psychology, the study of the message (and of the code of which it is an expression) in that of linguistics.
1964 Language 40 243 The central concern is how the bilingual speaker becomes ‘inputted’ for two language codes.
1965 Canad. Jrnl. Linguistics 11 41 Number and pattern (or ‘code’—a favourite term in linguistics).
2018 P. Eisenlohr Sounding Islam iv. 69 The use of a ritual, ‘ancestral’ linguistic code—that is, Urdu in the Mauritian context.
6. Biology. A means by which information and instructions determining the nature, development, and functions of living organisms is stored within them, esp. by the structure or organization of particular biomolecules; (also) a conformation or sequence of molecular components or physiological events embodying or conveying such information; spec. = genetic code n. at genetic adj. Compounds 2c.
ΘΚΠ
the mind > language > linguistics > [noun] > linguistic code or sub-code
code1944
subcode1960
the world > life > biology > biological processes > genetic activity > [noun] > genetic information storage
code script1915
code1944
plastome1954
coding1956
triplet code1957
1944 E. Schrödinger What is Life? v. 62 It is no longer inconceivable that the miniature code should precisely correspond with a highly complicated and specified plan of development and should somehow contain the means to put it into operation.
1953 J. D. Watson & F. H. C. Crick in Nature 30 May 965/2 In a long molecule many different permutations are possible, and it therefore seems likely that the precise sequence of the bases is the code which carries the genetical information.
1964 Science 11 Dec. 1428/1 Whether the goal of the electrophysiologist be to seek the codes that carry the messages in the physiologically normal brain or those that signal some hidden disease process,..investigators are giving increasing attention to probabilistic models.
1991 A. Horst Molecular Pathol. iii. 38 This is in accordance with the presence of two chain-terminating codons UAA UAG, terminating the code for the coat protein of phage R17.
2013 A. Rutherford Creation: Origin of Life Afterword 95 Viruses hijack a living cell, insert their own code and hope that it doesn't notice.
7. Computing. Any system of symbols and rules for expressing information or instructions in a form usable by a computer or other digital machine for processing or transmitting information. Also: information or instructions written according to such a system.Recorded earliest in code-punched.character code, machine code, object code, operation code, source code, etc.: see the first element.
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society > computing and information technology > programming language > program or code > [noun]
code1946
computer program1947
programme1947
main program1951
source code1965
1946 Nature 26 Oct. 568/1 The brains of the machine lie in the control tape, which is code-punched in three sections. The first instructs the machine where to find its data; the second gives the destination of the data or answer, the third dictates the process.
1948 Electronics Sept. 111/2 Orders to various parts of the machine..can be expressed conveniently as numbers in some arbitrary code.
1971 Techn. Communication 18 8/2 An unmodified ASCII code, to show standard control functions and alphanumetics, and a TTS code are shown in figure 5.
1980 Jrnl. Financial Educ. 9 99 FAS is written in a highly portable set of FORTRAN IV consisting of approximately 11,500 lines of code.
1991 B. Pfaffenberger Linux Clearly Explained ii. 38 Because programmers can modify the underlying code, companies can add features to the operating system that are needed for specific purposes.
2013 @AntonRSA 6 Apr. in twitter.com (accssed 21 Apr. 2020) Another Saturday working on some code for a new app. Seems like I can never get away from coding.
III. An individual sign or symbol.
8.
a. An individual word, symbol, sequence of digits, etc., having a particular meaning or function according to a system of signals, signs, machine or computer instructions, etc.See also time code n.control code, shift code: see the first element.
ΚΠ
1862 R. Bond Handbk. Telegr. 42 This is followed by your signalling the message prefix S, then the time code, and after that the number of words, the name and address of parties from and to, and then D Q.
1945 Collier's 17 Nov. 98/4 As the train approached a meal station the engineer blew a whistle code.
1954 Electronic Engin. 26 376/2 In the last 6 digits [of the instruction] is the binary code which operates the circuit to perform the required function, the adder.
1964 J. Bernstein Analyt. Engine (1965) iii. 83 This would be indicated by +601 301, where +601 is the code for STO, or ‘store’.
2000 SMT June 37/2 The message is preceded by the phrase 10–8. This code alerts the officer to take precautions, turning the volume down or moving to a position of privacy, in order that the message is not overheard.
b. A number, letter, or symbol, or a sequence of these, assigned to something for the purpose of identification or classification.Recorded earliest in code number n. at Compounds 4.Frequently in compounds, esp. designating codes assigned to geographical regions to aid post or telephone communication, e.g. area, dialling, post-, zip code (for which see the first element).
ΚΠ
1862 F. J. Bolton Brit. Patent 1399 1 The mariner when at sea will..be able at once to know what is the code number or name of the lighthouse.
1921 Cornell Daily Sun (Ithaca, N.Y.) 19 Jan. 3/2 Hang up the receiver for a full second, then remove it and dial the code for the Repair Clerk ‘113’, and report the trouble.
1967 Canad. Med. Assoc. Jrnl. 19 Aug. 395/2 The drugs were administered as absolutely identical white tablets and, to guarantee the strictness of the double-blind technique, no code letter was used.
1968 Internat. List of Post Offices (Eng. ed.) (Universal Postal Union) 9 The first group of two, three or four characters identifies the post town in which the letter is to be delivered and is referred to as the ‘outward’ part of the code.
1975 F. P. Heide & R. Heide Myst. of Bewitched Bookmobile vi. 69 You know, the catalog number on the spine of a library book. Every book has a code.
2012 N.Y. Times (Nexis) 13 June 1 Lasers engrave a unique microscopic numeric code on the tip of a gun's firing pin and breech face.
c. A sequence of numbers, letters, or symbols used to open a combination lock, authorize use of electronic equipment, etc.; a passcode.access, key, passcode: see the first element.
ΚΠ
1919 Country Life 27 Dec. p. xlviii/3 A combination lock fitted to the steering column..serves to lock this rigidly in position... The code of the lock can be changed as often as may be desired.
1962 Vidette (Valparaiso, Indiana) Messenger 23 Oct. A person may dial a unique code which will prohibit the placement of Direct Distance Dialing calls from his telephone.
1993 J. Kay Found. Corporate Success iii. v. 73 The purest form of organizational knowledge is where each employee knows one digit of the code which opens the safe.
2012 Independent 5 Apr. 44/3 Our passcodes can be cracked by a far more low-tech method... Unsightly finger smudges on the [smartphone] screen can easily give away your code.
Phrases
P1. With of, forming noun phrases.
a.
code of honour n. any (unwritten) set of rules, customs, or principles regulating the behaviour of a particular group of people; cf. honour n. 2a, honour code n. 1. [Probably after French code d'honneur (1752 or earlier).]
ΘΚΠ
society > society and the community > customs, values, and civilization > customs, values, or beliefs of a society or group > [noun] > set of
usagec1405
code of honour1771
code of conduct1814
honour code1845
1771 T. Smollett Humphry Clinker III. 158 It looks like compounding a sort of felony in the code of honour.
1843 C. J. Lever Jack Hinton (1878) xviii. 126 They know how imperative is the code of honour as regards a bet.
1887 T. Fowler Princ. Morals ii. iv Similarly, lawyers, doctors, clergymen, bankers are said to have a code of honour, or, what amounts to the same thing, to observe certain rules of professional etiquette.
1903 School Jrnl. 5 Sept. 194/2 The chief maxim of the recognized schoolboy code of honour—that one boy must not tell anything against another.
1999 S. Heaney in tr. Beowulf (2000) Introd. p. xi A pagan Germanic society governed by a heroic code of honour.
2018 Straits Times (Singapore) (Nexis) 13 Feb. (Life section) Martial arts exponents travel China trading blows, teaching skills and upholding a strict code of honour.
b.
code of practice n. a set of rules or guidelines that sets out agreed standards of behaviour or proper practices for a particular profession or business; cf. best practice n. at best adj., n.1, and adv. Compounds 2a.
ΘΚΠ
society > authority > control > [noun] > regulation > a regulation or rule > body or system of
disciplinea1393
formulary?1541
code1548
codex1577
rationale1580
disciplizationa1706
regimen1751
code of practice1783
1783 London Chron. 26–29 July 102/3 They are to meet again..in order to consider of a code of practice to be adopted in the several Courts.
1862 Amer. Law Reg. 10 248 The late English statutes, called the Common Law Procedure Acts, are well worthy of imitation upon this side of the Atlantic. In some respects, our codes of practice, and the consolidation of the different forms of action, have been far more radical than the English reforms.
1975 Times 2 Dec. 16/5 The hotel industry was warned that unless it agreed voluntarily to display prices to accord with an established code of practice, legal enforcement was likely.
2014 Sci. Amer. Apr. 8/2 In the absence of regulation, there have been some attempts to generate an industry code of practice for location-technology companies.
c.
code of conduct n. a set of principles; a (notional) set of rules and guidelines which outline the responsibilities of, or agreed standards of behaviour for, an individual or organization.
ΘΚΠ
society > society and the community > customs, values, and civilization > customs, values, or beliefs of a society or group > [noun] > set of
usagec1405
code of honour1771
code of conduct1814
honour code1845
1814 Monthly Rev. Oct. 161 Maxims which fail on trial are suffered to expire; and those which stand their ground are taught to grand-children as a treasury of wisdom. Tradition preserves awhile these efforts to generalize experience; and at length they are collected into a code of conduct by some judicious gnomologist.
1889 Nottingham Evening Post 9 Oct. 4/7 All carry out a strict code of honorable conduct... Not only collectively as a club, but as individuals, let this same strict code of conduct guide you.
2012 Independent 29 Nov. 31/1 So-called..‘street fund-raisers’ are seen by many as the scourge of the high street, but a new code of conduct may see shoppers across Britain breathe a sigh of relief as it sets out to curb aggressive money collecting which has plagued the practice.
d.
code of silence n. any (unwritten) rule, custom, or principle which involves a refusal to talk openly about something (typically clandestine or criminal activity), esp. as observed within a particular group or organization.
ΚΠ
1892 Monthly Packet Dec. 261 Your code of silence has given us all a miserable week. You should have told papa, Pat; he would have set it straight.
1938 U.S.A. before Securities & Exchange Comm. in Matter R. Whitney & Company I. 181 There was recurring evidence as to the existence of an unwritten code of silence in Stock Exchange circles which in practical effect prohibited a member from revealing that he had loaned money to a fellow member.
1977 Time (Atlantic ed.) 12 Sept. 43/1 The protection program was formally established after passage of the Organized Crime Control Act of 1970 to hasten the breakdown of omertà, the underworld code of silence.
2011 J. R. Baker & S. J. Rivele Vice iii. 33 ‘Maybe you see something that isn't exactly department procedure... You keep your mouth shut about that.’ It was my introduction to the cops' code of silence, which, though unwritten, was ironclad.
P2. in code.
a. In a system of communication in which each letter (or group of letters) in a written message is systematically substituted by another, or by a symbol, to enable transmission, esp. in electrical telegraphy, cryptography, etc., or in any system of communication in which information is conveyed concisely according to a set of previously agreed correspondences between words, symbols, sequences of numbers, signals, actions, etc., and the words, or meaning to be understood. Cf. sense 4a, 4b.
ΚΠ
1859 Contracts for Electric Telegraphs 2 in Sessional Papers House of Lords (H.L. 98) X. 1 The Rates to be charged for the Transmission of Messages in Code or Cypher..shall be higher.
1870 Corr. between N.Y., Newfoundland & London Telegr. Company & Internat. Ocean Telegr. Company 5 Double rates must be charged for all Government messages written in code or cypher.
1932 D. L. Sayers Have his Carcase xxviii. 368 The letter E appears both in code and clear.
1946 I. F. Stone Underground to Palestine 128 Anyone could see that a flashlight was signaling in code and being answered from a big boat off shore.
2000 Oldie Dec. 57/2 Since humans began writing, they have also been communicating in code.
b. In an indirect and often deliberately euphemistic way. Cf. sense 5a.
ΚΠ
1929 Amer. Speech 5 45 These jargons all have the same purpose: to exclude the uninitiate, and to provide a simple means for the exchange of ideas among the members of the craft. Craft slang is speaking in code.
1968 J. Didion Slouching towards Bethlehem ii. 165 When we talk about sale-leasebacks and right-of-way condemnations we are talking in code about the things we like best, the yellow fields and the cottonwoods and the rivers rising and falling.
1990 Austral. Financial Rev. (Nexis) 14 June (Late ed.) 75 The real meaning of an obit is often expressed in code: a man with a bold vision for Australia—means he had a lot of crackpot ideas.
2012 E. Giffen Where we Belong xiv. 174 ‘I think he's using those discussions to justify his inability to take the next step.’ ‘Christ. Wait. Back up and stop speaking in code,’ Jess says. ‘What's going on?’
P3. Originally North American. (up) to code: in line with the relevant rules or regulations; to or at the standard specified by law.Originally and chiefly with reference to building standards and related safety regulations.
ΚΠ
1923 Medina (Ohio) Sentinel 15 Mar. 4/3 Build an addition at the rear of the present building and bring it up to code.
1985 N.Y. Times 3 Nov. viii. 45/2 (advt.) Warehousing... Lighted, Air Conditioned, All to Code.
2018 N.Z. Herald (Nexis) 28 July The RSE visa bonds workers to one employer, which is subject to government inspection of any part of their RSE responsibilities. Fines can be imposed for not being up to code.
Compounds
C1. In senses 1, 2a. With participles, agent nouns, and verbal nouns, forming compounds in which code expresses the object of the underlying verb, as in code-abiding, code-making, code-violating (adjectives and nouns); code enforcer, code-maker, etc.
ΚΠ
1765 St James's Chron. 9-11 Apr. It were a thousand Pities that this moral and political Code should be stifled in the Birth... We are going to send Bishops to our Colonies; suppose this Codemaker were set to Work immediately, so as to have his System of Institution ready to embark with the first Detachment of our R. R. Missionaries.
1825 W. Cobbett Rural Rides in Cobbett's Weekly Polit. Reg. 12 Nov. 408 Doctor Black..is now filling whole columns with very just remarks on the new and terrible law, which makes the taking of an apple felony; but he says not a word about the silence of Sir Jammy (the humane code-softener) upon this subject!
1831 T. Carlyle in Edinb. Rev. Mar. 172 Such men usually take into Politics, and become Code-makers and Utilitarians.
1871 Athenæum 28 Jan. 83 Not only are the main States, as Chile and Bolivia, engaged in code-making, but the eight separate States of Columbia severally engage in the business, to the great benefit of the local lawyers.
1934 High Point (N. Carolina) Enterprise 26 June 4/1 These workers in Tennessee are the victims of their code-violating employers.
1969 Daily News-Bull. (Brookfield, Missouri) 14 May 1/3 A revised building code ordinance..specifying the duties of the code enforcer.
2013 Field Apr. 36/1 How else can the code-abiding majority of shooters stop the PR damage inflicted on all by the selfish minority who break the law and the sport's code.
C2. General use as modifier.
a. In senses 4a, 4b, as in code clerk, code machine, code message, code signal, code telegram, etc.
ΚΠ
1880 Brit. Postal Guide 241 Code telegrams are those composed of words, the context of which has no intelligible meaning.
1904 National Cycl. Amer. Biogr. XII. 537/1 A cipher code machine called a ‘cryptograph’ or typewriter for secret correspondence, having its type wheel so mounted that the characters printed are constantly changing.
1960 Guardian 16 Sept. 13/2 One of the two code clerks who defected to Russia.
1962 Listener 29 Nov. 931/2 A code message that will clear everything up when it is cracked.
1973 D. J. Goacher & J. G. Denny Teleprinter Handbk. ii. 35/2 The perforated tape forms a permanent record of all the code signals involved in a particular message in a form suitable for storage.
2001 Navy News Sept. 12/3 John Pegg..served in the wartime HMS Bulldog when she captured an Enigma code machine.
b. Computing. In sense 7, as in code file, code review, code snippet, etc.
ΚΠ
1949 Jrnl. Marketing 13 343/1 Any single run of the punched cards through the counting sorter sorts them into code groups for a given card column, or tallies the frequency within each code group.
1952 Math. Tables & Other Aids Computation 6 52 Rarely does a program work right the first time it is tried, so that efficient code checking techniques on the machine become necessary.
1970 Q. Rev. Biol. 45 297/2 Physical effects such as the atmospheric conditions, exposure, inclination, lock substrate, dimensions, and historical factors..were transferred to code form and processed by a computer.
1988 Proc. 11th National Computer Security Conf. (U.S. National Computer Security Center) 303/1 Not all the code files generated by systems-language compilers are dangerous.
1996 J. Rushby in V. Chandru & V. Vinay Found. Software Technol. & Theoret. Computer Sci. 43 Traditional methods of code review and testing are highly effective.
2003 R. Tiffany SQL Server CE Database Devel. iv. 69 I'll provide examples in the form of fully functional code snippets along with the necessary Imports to make the code work properly.
2009 J. P. Mueller C# Design & Devel. ii. 28 Part of the code writing process is to ensure that the system backs up code each day.
2017 E. Buchard Refactoring JavaScript iii. 27 Documenting your code paths in text allows manual steps to be repeatable and distributed among team members.
C3. As the first element of compounds with a colour as the second element, used to indicate a level of emergency or threat or to specify a situation requiring action or assistance, as in code blue, code orange, etc.Earliest in code red n.
ΘΚΠ
the world > action or operation > harm or detriment > danger > warning of imminent danger or evil > [noun] > specific types of warning
by-warning1542
gypsy's warning1824
red warning1940
yellow1940
red alert1941
yellow alert1941
red1943
code1957
amber alert1958
content warning1977
trigger warning1993
1957 Mag. Fantasy & Sci. Fiction Aug. 23/2 ‘What are you going to do?’ ‘Announce Code Red, place the ship off limits, put an armed guard on it.’
1967 Newslet. Univ. Calif. Pharmacy Alumni Assoc. Summer 17 The Unit's pharmacists are also members of the cardiac arrest team or ‘Code Blue Team’... Another responsibility delegated to us in a Code Blue call is to initiate external cardiac massage if we are the first to arrive on the scene.
1995 Independent (Nexis) 20 Apr. 3 The Oklahoma City authorities announced a Code Black disaster: local hospitals cancelled all non-emergency appointments; appeals were made to blood donors; [etc.].
2014 P. Timm School Security (2015) vii. 155 An announcement crackles from the loud speaker: ‘Attention: Code Orange. Code Orange’... ‘We need to lock the door, turn off the lights, and get to the back of the room away from the doors and windows,’ shouts one of the students.
C4.
codebase n. Computing a body of source code used to build a particular program or group of programs.
ΚΠ
1987 comp.protocols.tcp-ip 15 July (Usenet newsgroup, accessed 22 Apr. 2020) The most significant of these actions involves upgrades to our VAX/VMS product..especially converting to the use of 4.3BSD as a code base for the TCP/IP implementation.
2004 Games TM Apr. 33/2 At the end of the day we own the best database and an amazing codebase to make a management game with.
code-bearing adj. containing encoded information, esp. (Biology) as a sequence that can be transcribed according to the genetic code.
ΚΠ
1961 Cancer Chemotherapy Abstr. 2 909 It is suggested that the code-bearing sites of DNA are blocked by inter-molecular cross-linking between DNA and template products or enzymes.
2015 R. C. Francis in S. Olfman Sci. & Pseudoscience Children's Mental Health iii. 24 The abstract gene is one dimensional, a code-bearing sequence.
code bloat n. Computing unnecessary increase in the size of computer code, usually as a result of poor programming practices; (also) bloated computer code.
ΚΠ
1984 Macintosh Language Benchmarks in fa.info-mac (Usenet newsgroup, accessed 14 June 2005) 11 Nov. I haven't found any serious bugs, but code bloat is amazing.
1993 S. A. Maguire Writing Solid Code 125 That bug had been ‘fixed’ in Character Windows by the expedient of handling root-level windows in reverse order everywhere it mattered—adding to the code bloat.
2009 @aegisofpaean 8 July in twitter.com (accessed 20 Apr. 2020) Today's task—learning how to leverage xpath/xquery/xslt to remove code bloat.
code block n. Computing (a) a string of encoded characters; (b) (now more commonly) a block of source code treated as a single unit, often delimited by brackets.
ΚΠ
1958 Optica Acta 5 336/2 ‘Elastic’ encoding, in which the code blocks assigned to various values of the picture signal are unequal in length.
1972 Computer Jrnl. 15 22/2 The effect is to set a bit in the compiled code block of each of the lines in the list.
2003 D. Eisenreich & B. DeMuth Designing Embedded Internet Devices 37 Java..is very similar to C, C++, and other languages; it uses the familiar curly braces { } to denote code blocks.
code book n. a book containing a code (in various senses); esp. a list of letters or other expressions, and of their correlates in a code, arranged as a key for encoding and decoding.
ΘΚΠ
the world > action or operation > behaviour > a standard of conduct > [noun] > prescribed rule of conduct > book of
Facet1440
code book1703
the mind > mental capacity > knowledge > secrecy, concealment > code, cipher > [noun] > key
countercipher1598
key1605
code book1703
keyword1762
cipher-key1834
key card1841
cipher1885
1703 J. Quick Serious Inq. 37 We do utterly refuse all License to marry the Brother's Wife, or to be joyned unto two Sisters, Code Book 5. Tit. 5. Law 4. of Valentin and Theodosius.
1844 Niles' National Reg. 27 Jan. 395/3 Such an enactment is disgraceful to our code book. It is to say the least of it, as unjustifiable as the British Crown duty on tobacco.
1884 Electrician 14 62/1 This firm recommends the use of the ‘ABC Telegraphic Code Book’.
1908 Westm. Gaz. 15 Oct. 4/2 The Royal Automobile Club proposes..to establish a law unto itself, with its own code-books of rules, morals, and punishments.
1964 Y. Bar-Hillel Lang. & Information xvi. 279 A short signal sequence..to be decoded at the receiving end with the help of a code-book.
2000 Observer 18 June (Review section) 11/6 The seizure of the Enigma codebooks was, without doubt, among the crucial episodes in Britain's prosecution of the war.
2002 Daily Tel. 20 Aug. 23/1 Messages were first encoded in five-figure groups taken from a code book.
code breaker n. a person who solves or deciphers a code (sense 4); (also) a computer or program used for doing this; cf. code cracker n.
ΘΚΠ
the mind > mental capacity > knowledge > secrecy, concealment > code, cipher > decoding, deciphering > [noun] > one who decodes
decipherer1587
decoder1920
cryptanalyst1921
code breaker1925
code cracker1939
the mind > mental capacity > knowledge > secrecy, concealment > code, cipher > decoding, deciphering > [noun] > electronic device
decoder1920
code breaker1925
code cracker1939
1925 L. F. Safford Functions & Duties Cryptogr. Section Naval Communications 8 When the manuscript is finished it is given to the ‘code-breakers’.
1932 Pop. Mech. Apr. 639/1 The keenest code breaker is said to have been an Oxford Greek professor.
1983 Austral. Personal Computer Aug. 106/3 Supposing that the original message, the plaintext, was ‘11’, and the ciphertext was ‘2’, the codebreaker has no way of working backwards from ‘2’ to ‘11’.
2018 tellyspotting.kera.org 29 Nov. (accessed 15 May 2019) It was her mastery of languages..that led her to become a member of the legendary code-breakers of Bletchley Park in Buckinghamshire.
code breaking n. the action or process of solving or deciphering a code or cipher ( 4); frequently as a modifier; cf. code cracking n.
ΘΚΠ
the mind > mental capacity > knowledge > secrecy, concealment > code, cipher > decoding, deciphering > [noun]
decipher1545
deciphering1552
decipheration1651
decipherment1782
decipherage1851
decoding1897
cryptanalysis1923
code cracking1931
decrypting1938
code breaking1945
decryption1946
1945 Congress. Rec. 24 Sept. vii. 8939/2 (heading) Is code breaking story a phoney?
1964 J. Z. Young Model of Brain viii. 128 In the procedures for code-breaking adopted by cryptographers the problem is to discover the relevant features of, say, ink-marks or electrical signals that are being used for communication.
2015 L. Hunt 13 Days of Midnight v. 157 Elza tries numerous code-breaking techniques she's found online, without success.
code-choice n. Linguistics the action or an act of selecting which of two or more languages, dialects, or registers to use within a discourse.
ΚΠ
1967 Anthropol. Linguistics 9 iii. 25 Motivational as well as situational factors influence code choice. A party to an encounter has his own interests to consider.
1993 Lang. in Society 22 476 I begin with the premise that speakers make code choices at any linguistic level to negotiate interpersonal relationships.
2014 R. Bassiouney Lang. & Identity in Mod. Egypt 1 One cannot describe the social and political changes in Egypt without referring to the diglossic community and how code-choice reflects a political or social stand in most cases.
code cracker n. a person who solves or deciphers a code (sense 4); (also) a computer, program, etc., used for doing this; cf. code breaker n.In quot. 1939 with reference to the 1938 U.S. film Cipher Bureau.
ΘΚΠ
the mind > mental capacity > knowledge > secrecy, concealment > code, cipher > decoding, deciphering > [noun] > one who decodes
decipherer1587
decoder1920
cryptanalyst1921
code breaker1925
code cracker1939
the mind > mental capacity > knowledge > secrecy, concealment > code, cipher > decoding, deciphering > [noun] > electronic device
decoder1920
code breaker1925
code cracker1939
1939 Hammond (Indiana) Times 20 Jan. 11/6 (advt.) Uncle Sam's Code Crackers.
1996 McGraw-Hill's Biotechnol. Newswatch (Nexis) 4 Mar. 13 Memory banks that can store a million times more data than a comparable CD-ROM..and code-crackers that can test thousands of keys to a cipher at once.
2012 Economist 8 Sept. 58/3 Their ability to spot patterns can make them ace code-crackers.
code cracking n. the action or process of solving or breaking a code or cipher; frequently as a modifier; cf. code breaking n.
ΘΚΠ
the mind > mental capacity > knowledge > secrecy, concealment > code, cipher > decoding, deciphering > [noun]
decipher1545
deciphering1552
decipheration1651
decipherment1782
decipherage1851
decoding1897
cryptanalysis1923
code cracking1931
decrypting1938
code breaking1945
decryption1946
1931 Montana Standard 16 Jan. 6/4 With his war service and subsequent press career completed.., Childs' mind reverted to his code-cracking experience.
2003 S. Greenfield Tomorrow's People (2004) iv. 87 Easy code-cracking and infiltration of secret material would have, obviously, devastating financial and military consequences.
code generation n. Computing the action or process by which a code generator converts source code into object code.
ΚΠ
1963 Communications ACM 6 399/1 In light of the organization of the compiler into lexical analysis, syntactic analysis and synthesis (including data storage allocation in the Data Division and code generation in the Procedure Division), with the three in series there is a clear-cut strategy for getting both high compiling speed and low space consumption.
1970 Math. of Computation 24 235 Chapter 8 describes the code generation process in additional detail.
1993 UNIX Rev. May 39 (advt.) We've also augmented the toolset with support for C++ 3.0 templates, nested classes, C++3.0 exception handling and graphical C++ code generation.
2011 P. S. Wang Mastering Linux 266 The compiling phase takes the output of the preprocessing phase and performs parsing and code generation.
code generator n. Computing the part of a compiler that converts source code into object code.
ΚΠ
1963 IBM Syst. Jrnl. 2 313 MAP Code Generator. An interpretive string concatenation subroutine used to fabricate the ibmap input cards.]
1966 W. B. Lampson Ref. Man.: Compiler Package (U.S. Office Secretary Def.) (rev. ed.) Introd. 1-1 A collection of miscellaneous routines provide for error correction, control of panics, initialization, pagination and a limited amount of control over three word/cell forward-chained lists which are used by the code generator.
2005 J. S. Warford Computer Syst. (ed. 3) vii. 379 The three translation phases of an automatic translator are the lexical analyzer, the parser, and the code generator.
code grabber n. an electronic device used esp. by thieves to intercept wireless codes for operating alarms, car or garage doors, etc., by remote control.
ΚΠ
1993 Proc. IEE Colloquium Vehicle Security Syst. No. 9 2 Testing includes the use of code grabbers where a radio key fob is used to control the immobilisation.
2013 Edmonton (Alberta) Jrnl. (Nexis) 9 Nov. g2 If you have an older model..you may want to replace it with the newer version that has something called rolling codes. The newer units make it almost impossible for a burglar to use a code grabber to capture the frequency to gain entry.
code language n. (a) any system of codes or signals used for telegraphic or other communication (cf. sense 4); (b) (in extended use) words or phrases used to represent others in an indirect or euphemistic way.
ΘΚΠ
the mind > mental capacity > knowledge > secrecy, concealment > code, cipher > [noun]
cipher1528
steganography1569
polygraphy1593
jargon1594
cryptography1653
code1818
code language1875
1875 Times 11 Dec. 6/2 We have done nothing more than..to endeavour to separate ordinary code language from the unfair abuse of combinations and cipher telegrams.
1903 Mt. Barker (S. Austral.) Courier 16 Sept. This difficulty..is overcome through a code language of luggage labels, and the servants in almost every hotel are able to know directly a visitor arrives, by merely glancing at his luggage, what to expect and how to treat him.
1928 W. F. Friedman Rep. Hist. Use Codes & Code Lang. (Internat. Radiotelegr. Conf. 1927) 4 Code language is employed in telegrams for purposes of economy, or secrecy, or both.
1960 Guardian 19 Feb. 11/7 Yesterday's ‘Pravda’ added that they [sc. newspapers] had propagated ‘cheap philistine tastes in articles of low ideological quality’, but this is merely code-language for yet another variety of this dread infection—‘cultural nationalism’.
2018 Financial Law Reporter (Nexis) 10 Nov. The group used code language when communicating amongst themselves to avoid detection by police.
code-mixing n. Linguistics the action of mixing languages, dialects, or registers within a discourse; cf. code-switching n.Sometimes used as a synonym for code-switching, but often distinguished; for example, some use code-mixing when referring to such changes taking place frequently within a discourse without the presence of changes in social context.
ΚΠ
1972 Lang. in Society 1 202 The relation between the language varieties are not such as to maintain strict segregation: there is code-mixing in conversation, as well as code-switching.
2008 D. Crystal Txtng vii. 130 As most parts of the world are bilingual, I would expect code-mixing to develop to be a major characteristic of texting.
code monkey n. colloquial a computer programmer; spec. (depreciative) one who does menial work or who has limited experience or skills.
ΚΠ
1992 comp.software-eng 7 Dec. (Usenet newsgroup, accessed 24 Apr. 2020) The problem with standard libraries and OO methods is that code monkeys will suddenly find that it is not enough to churn out pieces of highly specific almost identical code.
1995 Entertainm. Weekly 8 Dec. 72/2 Hollywood's PR outposts have come to represent state-of-the-art Webbery. The studios have the bucks and clout to hire the hippest design firms and most talented code monkeys.
2019 @yipe 4 June in twitter.com (accessed 20 Apr. 2020) To me that says that engineers are just code monkeys, not people who contribute to culture, team, or process.
code number n. a sequence of numbers (and occasionally letters) used to identify, classify, or signify something.
ΘΚΠ
society > communication > indication > marking > marking to identify > mark of identification > [noun] > number
numberc1350
reference number1730
serial number1838
code number1862
key code1941
1862 F. J. Bolton Brit. Patent 1399 1 The mariner when at sea will..be able at once to know what is the code number or name of the lighthouse.
1922 N.Y. Tribune 8 Oct. 3/4 Code numbers have been arranged for convenience... These code numbers are 211 for long distance calls, 411 for information calls.
1959 W. S. Sharps Dict. Cinematogr. 85/2 Code numbers, a series of numbers and key letters printed by film manufacturers on negative film at one foot intervals and used for stock identification.
2004 H. Kennedy Just Law (2005) xiii. 266 A code number was given to the inmate so that his name was secret and he was not readily identified but the Crown was able to de-encrypt the results.
code red n. (also with capital initials) (an urgent warning signalling) a state of emergency or imminent danger; a situation requiring immediate action; cf. red adj. 16.
ΚΠ
1957 Mag. Fantasy & Sci. Fiction Aug. 23/2 ‘What are you going to do?’ ‘Announce Code Red, place the ship off limits, put an armed guard on it.’
1973 Sioux Center (Iowa) News 14 June 7/4 The R.N. who takes the message will call a ‘Code Red’ on the intercom and have all employees report to the nurses stations.
1980 Associated Press Newswire (Nexis) 27 Mar. Buzzers shriek. Lights flash. Needles quiver at the wrong ends of gauges and dials. ‘This is Pilgrim nuclear station. We have a code red. I repeat—we have a code red.’
2016 Daily Mirror (Nexis) 24 Dec. Yo, guys, got an urgent code red situation here—Charlotte's nappy needs changing.
code script n. a representation of information in coded form; spec. (a) (Biology) (Schrödinger's term for) a sequence of stored or transcribed genetic information; (b) (Computing) a sequence of program instructions or commands; = script n.1 5.In quot. 1915, a transcript of a coded message.
ΘΚΠ
the world > life > biology > biological processes > genetic activity > [noun] > genetic information storage
code script1915
code1944
plastome1954
coding1956
triplet code1957
1915 E. Voûte Passport xv. 211 His first thought, as he leaped out of bed, was the code script.
1944 E. Schrödinger What is Life? ii. 20 It is these chromosomes, or probably only an axial skeleton fibre of what we actually see under the microscope as the chromosome, that contain in some kind of code-script the entire pattern of the individual's future development.
1963 C. Y. Lee in Proc. Symp. Math. Theory Automata 155 (title) A Turing machine which prints its own code script.
2003 L. Moss What Genes can't Do iii. 95 Something like a modified story about genetic code-scripts dictating life-forms may still be defensible.
2015 M. P. Pettersson et al. Polynomial Chaos Methods for Hyperbolic Partial Differential Equations Preface p. v To enhance understanding of the material presented, we provide exercises and code scripts and building blocks that can be extended to new problem settings.
code talker n. (also with capital initials) a North American Indian member of the U.S. military who participated in a cryptology programme during the Second World War (1939–45), in which indigenous languages (most notably Navajo) were used to transmit coded messages.A similar programme took place during the First World War (1914–18), but participants do not appear to have been known as code talkers at the time.In later use occasionally with reference to people using other little-known languages for secret military communications at different times.
ΚΠ
1945 Marine Corps Gaz. Sept. 10/1 The dark-skinned, black-haired Navajo code talker, huddled over a portable radio or field phone.., has been a familiar sight in the Pacific battle zone.
2005 High Country News 22 Aug. 24/2 Code Talkers such as Draper were invaluable during the war because they could transmit secret information in a language the enemy found incomprehensible.
code violation n. (a) an infringement of a code of regulations, code of conduct, etc.; (b) spec. (Tennis) an infringement of the rules governing player behaviour, repeated instances of which in a match lead to penalties of increasing severity, culminating in disqualification; (also) a warning issued to a player by the umpire that such an infringement has taken place.
ΚΠ
1897 Times & Reg. (Philadelphia) 24 July 53/2 The resolutions adopted by the County Medical Association went farther than to condemn the code violation, but pledged itself to force the fighting and agitation until the wrong is righted.
1933 Yale Law Jrnl. 43 p. viii/1 Availability of private injunction against code violation prior to review by Code Authority.
1982 Anderson (Indiana) Daily Bull. 24 June 15/2 Code violation, abuse of ball, warning.
1993 Village Voice (N.Y.) 12 Jan. 11/5 Freidmutter says code violations were fixed and two floors rehabbed.
2008 P. Sampras & P. Bodo Champion's Mind viii. 208 The umpire..didn't even warn me, much less issue the appropriate code violation and fine (for ‘racket abuse’).
2019 Federalist Society (Nexis) 11 Apr. Building tenants complain code violations go unenforced.
code word n. (a) a word representing another word, phrase, etc., in a predetermined code (cf. senses 4 and 8a); esp. (originally) such a word used in telegraphy; (b) (in extended use) any word or phrase used to represent another in an indirect or euphemistic way.
ΚΠ
1855 Shaffner's Telegr. Compan. July 212 The regulation being, that code words shall not exceed two syllables in length.
1884 Pall Mall Gaz. 12 Sept. 5/1 Telegraph companies had to face..the extension of the use of code words.
1918 Yale Rev. Jan. 255 When he ventured..to smile at the people of Europe clamoring in divers tongues to the Almighty, and all ‘calling for victory which is the code word for slaughter’, we listened, chilled and affronted.
1950 Washington Post 7 Apr. c7/1 ‘Steeplechase’ is the code word for a gala time in Capital date books this weekend, as many prominent Washingtonians travel to Warrington for..the Virginia Gold Cup races.
1968 Illustr. London News 14 Dec. 43/4 The whole garden irrigation system, was controlled by telephone: the owner could phone from anywhere she happened to be, and by speaking certain code words, switch various controls on and off.
1994 T. Clancy Debt of Honor xviii. 284 ‘Tango, tango, tango’, Commander Steve Kennedy said..giving the code word for a theoretical or ‘administrative’ torpedo launch.
2006 Foreign Affairs Mar. 64 Washington's use of the term ‘democracy promotion’ has come to be seen overseas not as the expression of a principled American aspiration but as a code word for ‘regime change’—namely, the replacement of bothersome governments by military force or other means.
This entry has been updated (OED Third Edition, September 2020; most recently modified version published online March 2022).
codev.
/kəʊd/, U.S. /koʊd/ I. Senses relating to systems of law, etc.
1. transitive. To enter or record (something) in a system or collection of rules or laws. In later use: to codify (laws, regulations, etc.).
ΘΚΠ
society > law > written law > [verb (transitive)] > reduce to or insert in a code
code1815
codify1816
the world > space > relative position > arrangement or fact of being arranged > arrange [verb (transitive)] > enter in a code or system
code1815
1815 H. H. Milman Fazio iii. ii. 68 Robbery, by the laws of Florence, Is sternly coded as a deadly crime.
1872 Birmingham Daily Post 20 Dec. 7/1 The business of the meeting principally was for coding rules for the governance of a trade society.
1892 Chums 5 Oct. 56/1 The Rugby Union was formed..for the purpose of revising and coding the existing rules under which the so-called Rugby football was played.
1928 Western Daily Press 24 May 7/3 In the main that Act only coded existing law.
1989 K. Arthur Lord, I need Grace to Make It iv. 88 Because they [sc. Pharisees] had coded the law, they were certain they were righteous.
II. Senses relating to systems of signs or symbols.
2. transitive. Originally in Telegraphy: to prepare (a message) for transmission by putting it into code words (now chiefly historical). In later use also: to convert (a message) into any form of code or cipher, for speed or secrecy in communication; to encode; to encipher.See note on usage at code n. 4b.In quot. 1903, referring to maritime signal flags.
ΘΚΠ
the mind > mental capacity > knowledge > secrecy, concealment > code, cipher > express in code [verb (transitive)] > convert into code
code1873
encipher1885
encode1919
encrypt1950
1873 W. Clauson-Thue ABC Universal Commerc. Electric Telegr. Code 25 01213..You have wrongly coded your message, please wire again.
1903 T. Hardy Dynasts I. v. iii. 91 Now that the fume has lessened, code my biddance Upon our only mast.
1924 J. Galsworthy Forest 1 I'm going to code that cable.
1942 N.Y. Times 3 June 19/1 The messages are coded by another feminine platoon which sits, day and night, behind screens in Ferrying Command headquarters.
1944 H. F. Harvey in H. L. Seward Marine Engin. II. 586/2 To assure privacy, the message is automatically coded by a ‘scrambling’ device in the circuit and is ‘descrambled’ by the receiving station.
1979 R. E. Weber U.S. Diplomatic Codes & Ciphers 1775–1938 viii. 241 Expunge from the message thus far coded all the code-words which cover the words found in that expression.
1999 J. Naughton Brief Hist. Future iii. 37 In 1997.., it [sc. the Net] was used by a group of researchers as a giant supercomputer to unscramble a message which had been coded with heavy-duty encryption software.
3. transitive. To assign a code to (something) for purposes of classification or identification.
ΘΚΠ
society > communication > indication > signalling > signal (something) [verb (transitive)] > enter in a code
code1885
1885 Law Times 21 Nov. 44/1 The clerk was engaged..in forwarding these messages, all of which he coded as having been sent out at 2.25 in the afternoon.
1963 Pop. Sci. July 47/2 Railroad cars..are coded with Scotchlite reflective tape for high-speed identification by an electronic scanner.
1978 Register (Orange County, Calif.) 13 Feb. Some European sun care products..are coded with sun protection factor numbers making it simpler for those of diverse skin types to choose the right protection.
2018 RSF: Russell Sage Found. Jrnl. Social Sci. 4 180 Everyone in a family was coded as belonging to a single, cohabiting, or married family.
4. Computing.
a. transitive. To convert (information) into code usable by a computer; to express (data or instructions) as computer code; to write or edit code for (a computer program, application, etc.).
ΘΚΠ
society > computing and information technology > programming language > program or code > [verb (transitive)]
programme1945
code1948
1948 Electronics Sept. 116/1 Orders themselves are coded to appear as numbers.
1961 Technometrics 3 125/1 An attempt has been made to allow for flexibility of input and output by making provisions that allow the input data to be coded in either fixed or floating-point form.
1994 B. J. Holmes Modula-2 Programming (ed. 2) 59 An alternative method of coding the Boolean expression could have been reply = ‘Y’.
2015 B. Payne Teach your Kids to Code 8 From the foundation you'll build in these first programs, you can go on to code games, mobile apps, web apps, and more.
b. intransitive. To write or edit computer code (see code n. 7). Cf. programme v. 5b.
ΚΠ
1954 Math. Tables & Other Aids Computation 8 171 It..provides an excellent means for learning to code on the UNIVAC.
1979 Computerworld 29 Oct. 28/1 When coding, there is never any question as to where you goto or perform thru, and with the numbering scheme, it is easy to find..errors.
1988 Dr. Dobb's Jrnl. Aug. 260/3 I am vexed with..macro files that encourage you to code in some nonstandard syntax, which is then translated into C.
2018 @guincodes 19 June in twitter.com (accessed 4 June 2019) Omg I'm coding in public and just ran into a lady who was coding in Assembly for IBM back in the sixties. I'm so impressed.
5. Biology.
a. transitive. To represent in terms of the genetic code (code n. 6); to contain the information for production of (a molecule or process); to be the genetic code for (an amino acid, peptide, or protein).
ΚΠ
1956 [implied in: F. Crick Let. 30 Apr. in H. F. Judson Eighth Day Creation (1979) vi. 318 Re coding. Leslie [Orgel], John Griffith & I have deduced the magic 20, using a code having 3 bases to 1 amino acid. (at coding n. 5)].
1957 Jrnl. Cellular & Compar. Physiol. 50 Suppl. i.219 I always have to fight people who think that only RNA is necessary for coding protein formation.
1961 F. H. C. Crick et al. in Nature 30 Dec. 1227/1 A group of three bases..codes one amino-acid.
2005 Guardian 25 July i. 11/4 This type of gene is known as a pseudogene and is like a molecular fossil. It presumably once coded a functional protein but no longer does so.
2011 H. M. Roche et al. in S. A. Lanham-New et al. Nutrition & Metabolism (ed. 2) ii. 18/2 Translation is the process by which the genetic information coded in mRNA is converted into an amino acid sequence.
b. intransitive. to code for: to be the genetic code for (an amino acid, peptide, or protein); to be the genetic determiner of (a trait).
ΘΚΠ
the world > life > biology > biological processes > genetic activity > [verb (transitive)] > be the genetic code for
to code for1957
1957 Proc. National Acad. Sci. U.S.A. 43 687 Thus [in theory] the sequence ABCDA codes for three amino acids: ABC for the first, BCD for the second, and CDA for the third.
1969 New Scientist 18 Dec. 590 They contain more than enough RNA—about 3300 nucleotides—whereas only 3000 or so are needed to code for the three proteins.
1978 Sci. Amer. Sept. 52/2 There is a locus on one pair of homologous chromosomes that codes for eye color.
1983 D. J. Weatherall et al. Oxf. Textbk. Med. I. iv. 23/2 Genes coding for mammalian peptide chains are interrupted by a number of non-coding sequences or introns.
2014 A. Roberts Incredible Unlikeliness of Being 224 This gene codes for the enzyme lactase, which allows us to digest the milk protein lactose.
III. Extended uses.
6. transitive. Linguistics. To represent or express (an utterance, idea, etc.) in a language, or in a particular dialect or register of a language.
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1957 Internat. Jrnl. Amer. Linguistics 23 225/2 Morphemes are not literally composed of phonemes; rather, morphemic and phonemic representation are two ways of coding utterances, related by morpho-phonemic rules.
1998 Lit. & Ling. Computing 13 53/1 Mair's study focuses on the process of grammaticalization, i.e. the process in which a lexical item acquires over the course of time new morphosyntactic forms and begins to code relationships that it had not coded before.
2016 Anthropol. Linguistics 58 316 Permanent states, such as being tall, strong, small, etc., are all coded as adjectives in Tunica,..not as intransitive verbs.
7. transitive. To shape (something) according to any (unwritten) system of social or cultural conventions or customs; to assign a category, meaning, or symbolism to (something) according to such a system. Frequently with as.
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1970 R. L. Birdwhistell Kinesics & Context i. vi. 44 Let me stress again that these positions, movements, and expressions are culturally coded—that what is viewed as masculine in one culture may be regarded as feminine in another.
1986 H. J. Maroney in J. Mitchell & A. Oakley What is Feminism? 101 Women's efforts towards collective self-definition have revalorized attributes and activities culturally coded as feminine.
2003 Bitch Summer 35/1 Cultural ideas about gender are never more obviously on display as when an otherwise gender-neutral toy is coded as either masculine or feminine by its styling.
2019 J. M. Metzl Dying of Whiteness 72 From before the birth of the nation, American laws, mores, and traditions coded armed white men as defenders and armed black men as threats.
8. transitive. To express (an idea, emotion, etc.) indirectly or in a deliberately euphemistic way.
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1978 Black Enterprise Jan. 41 Coded in words such as ‘quotas’ and ‘lower standards’, the new racism has changed its form but not its substance, and is still old and deadly.
2019 J. Coffin Roughhouse Friday xi. 173 I never talked that way to women—so directly, so honestly. I usually coded my desire in all sorts of indifferent posturing that rarely made its way to the surface.
This entry has been updated (OED Third Edition, September 2020; most recently modified version published online March 2022).
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