patch

  1. Noun.  A piece of cloth, or other suitable material, sewed or otherwise fixed upon a garment to repair or strengthen it, especially upon an old garment to cover a hole.
  2. Noun.  A small piece of anything used to repair a breach; as, a patch on a kettle, a roof, etc.
  3. Noun.  A small piece of black silk stuck on the face, or neck, to hide a defect, or to heighten beauty.
  4. Noun.  (medicine) A piece of material used to cover a wound.
  5. Noun.  (medicine) An adhesive piece of material, impregnated with a drug, which is worn on the skin; the drug being slowly absorbed over a period of time.
  6. Noun.  (medicine) A cover worn over a damaged eye, an eyepatch.
  7. Noun.  A small area, a small piece of ground; a tract; a plot; as, scattered patches of trees or growing corn.
  8. Noun.  A period of time.
  9. Noun.  (rfc-def) (figuratively) A fit.
  10. Noun.  A block on the muzzle of a gun, to do away with the effect of dispart, in sighting.
  11. Noun.  (computing) A file describing changes made to a computer file or files, usually changes made to a computer program that fix a programming bug.
  12. Noun.  (computing) A patch file, a file used for input to a patch program.
  13. Noun.  A small piece of material that is manually passed through a gun barrel to clean it.
  14. Noun.  A piece of greased cloth or leather used as wrapping for a rifle ball, to make it fit the bore.
  15. Noun.  (often, '''patch cable''', '''patch cord'''{{,) etc.; see also patch panel}} A cable connecting two pieces of electrical equipment.
  16. Verb.  To mend by sewing on a piece or pieces of cloth, leather, or the like; as, to patch a coat.
  17. Verb.  To mend with pieces; to repair with pieces fastened on.
  18. Verb.  To repair clumsily; as, to patch the roof of a house.
  19. Verb.  To adorn, as the face, with a patch or patches.
  20. Verb.  To make of pieces or patches like a quilt.
  21. Verb.  To repair as with patches.
  22. Verb.  To arrange in a hasty or clumsy manner; – generally with up; as, to patch up a truce.
  23. Verb.  (computing) To make the changes a patch describes; to apply a patch to the files in question. Hence:.
  24. Verb.  To connect two pieces of electrical equipment using a cable.
  25. Noun.  (archaic) A paltry fellow; a rogue; a ninny; a fool.

This is an unmodified, but possibly outdated, definition from Wiktionary and used here under the Creative Commons license. Wiktionary is a great resource. If you like it too, please donate to Wikimedia.

This entry was last updated on RefTopia from its source on 3/20/2012.