Result from Foreign Dictionaries (4 entries found)

From The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48 [gcide]: Patch \Patch\ (p[a^]ch), v. t. [imp. & p. p. {Patched} (p[a^]cht); p. pr. & vb. n. {Patching}.] 1. To mend by sewing on a piece or pieces of cloth, leather, or the like; as, to patch a coat. [1913 Webster] 2. To mend with pieces; to repair with pieces festened on; to repair clumsily; as, to patch the roof of a house. [1913 Webster] 3. To adorn, as the face, with a patch or patches. [1913 Webster] Ladies who patched both sides of their faces. --Spectator. [1913 Webster] 4. To make of pieces or patches; to repair as with patches; to arrange in a hasty or clumsy manner; -- generally with up; as, to patch up a truce. "If you'll patch a quarrel." --Shak. [1913 Webster] From The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48 [gcide]: Patch \Patch\, n. [OE. pacche; of uncertain origin, perh. for placche; cf. Prov. E. platch patch, LG. plakk, plakke.] 1. A piece of cloth, or other suitable material, sewed or otherwise fixed upon a garment to repair or strengthen it, esp. upon an old garment to cover a hole. [1913 Webster] Patches set upon a little breach. --Shak. [1913 Webster] 2. Hence: A small piece of anything used to repair a breach; as, a patch on a kettle, a roof, etc. [1913 Webster] 3. A small piece of black silk stuck on the face, or neck, to hide a defect, or to heighten beauty. [1913 Webster] Your black patches you wear variously. --Beau. & Fl. [1913 Webster] 4. (Gun.) A piece of greased cloth or leather used as wrapping for a rifle ball, to make it fit the bore. [1913 Webster] 5. Fig.: Anything regarded as a patch; a small piece of ground; a tract; a plot; as, scattered patches of trees or growing corn. [1913 Webster] Employed about this patch of ground. --Bunyan. [1913 Webster] 6. (Mil.) A block on the muzzle of a gun, to do away with the effect of dispart, in sighting. [1913 Webster] 7. A paltry fellow; a rogue; a ninny; a fool. [Obs. or Colloq.] "Thou scurvy patch." --Shak. [1913 Webster] {Patch ice}, ice in overlapping pieces in the sea. {Soft patch}, a patch for covering a crack in a metallic vessel, as a steam boiler, consisting of soft material, as putty, covered and held in place by a plate bolted or riveted fast. [1913 Webster] From WordNet (r) 3.0 (2006) [wn]: patch n 1: a small contrasting part of something; "a bald spot"; "a leopard's spots"; "a patch of clouds"; "patches of thin ice"; "a fleck of red" [syn: {spot}, {speckle}, {dapple}, {patch}, {fleck}, {maculation}] 2: a small area of ground covered by specific vegetation; "a bean plot"; "a cabbage patch"; "a briar patch" [syn: {plot}, {plot of land}, {plot of ground}, {patch}] 3: a piece of cloth used as decoration or to mend or cover a hole 4: a period of indeterminate length (usually short) marked by some action or condition; "he was here for a little while"; "I need to rest for a piece"; "a spell of good weather"; "a patch of bad weather" [syn: {while}, {piece}, {spell}, {patch}] 5: a short set of commands to correct a bug in a computer program 6: a connection intended to be used for a limited time [syn: {temporary hookup}, {patch}] 7: sewing that repairs a worn or torn hole (especially in a garment); "her stockings had several mends" [syn: {mend}, {patch}, {darn}] 8: a protective cloth covering for an injured eye [syn: {eyepatch}, {patch}] 9: a piece of soft material that covers and protects an injured part of the body [syn: {bandage}, {patch}] v 1: to join or unite the pieces of; "patch the skirt" [syn: {patch}, {piece}] 2: provide with a patch; also used metaphorically; "The field was patched with snow" 3: mend by putting a patch on; "patch a hole" [syn: {patch}, {patch up}] 4: repair by adding pieces; "She pieced the china cup" [syn: {piece}, {patch}] From The Jargon File (version 4.4.7, 29 Dec 2003) [jargon]: patch 1. n. A temporary addition to a piece of code, usually as a {quick-and-dirty} remedy to an existing bug or misfeature. A patch may or may not work, and may or may not eventually be incorporated permanently into the program. Distinguished from a {diff} or {mod} by the fact that a patch is generated by more primitive means than the rest of the program; the classical examples are instructions modified by using the front panel switches, and changes made directly to the binary executable of a program originally written in an {HLL}. Compare {one-line fix}. 2. vt. To insert a patch into a piece of code. 3. [in the Unix world] n. A {diff} (sense 2). 4. A set of modifications to binaries to be applied by a patching program. IBM operating systems often receive updates to the operating system in the form of absolute hexadecimal patches. If you have modified your OS, you have to disassemble these back to the source. The patches might later be corrected by other patches on top of them (patches were said to ?grow scar tissue?). The result was often a convoluted {patch space} and headaches galore. 5. [Unix] the patch(1) program, written by Larry Wall, which automatically applies a patch (sense 3) to a set of source code. There is a classic story of a {tiger team} penetrating a secure military computer that illustrates the danger inherent in binary patches (or, indeed, any patches that you can't ? or don't ? inspect and examine before installing). They couldn't find any {trap door}s or any way to penetrate security of IBM's OS, so they made a site visit to an IBM office (remember, these were official military types who were purportedly on official business), swiped some IBM stationery, and created a fake patch. The patch was actually the trapdoor they needed. The patch was distributed at about the right time for an IBM patch, had official stationery and all accompanying documentation, and was dutifully installed. The installation manager very shortly thereafter learned something about proper procedures.