socket - Wiktionary, the free dictionary (original) (raw)

From Wiktionary, the free dictionary

A socket (noun sense 1.1) in France.

A set of sockets (noun sense 1.3) and the socket wrench (ratchet wrench) that attaches to them.

This is the jawbone of a rat; the sockets (noun sense 1.2) are what held the teeth.

From Middle English socket, soket, from Anglo-Norman soket (“spearhead”), diminutive of Old French soc (“plowshare”), from Vulgar Latin *soccus, a word borrowed from Gaulish, from Proto-Celtic *sukkos (compare modern Welsh swch (“plowshare”)), literally "pig's snout", from Proto-Indo-European *suH-.

socket (plural sockets)

  1. Any of various concave objects (or portions of larger objects) that envelop a counterpart object.
    1. (electricity) An opening into which a plug or other connecting part is designed to fit (e.g. a light bulb socket).
      Near-synonyms: jack, outlet, receptacle, wall socket
      • 2021 December 29, “Network News: HS2 rolling stock”, in RAIL, number 947, page 7:
        Each seat must have a 230V socket, a USB socket, a coat hook, reading light and cup holder.
    2. (anatomy) A hollow into a bone which a part fits, such as an eye, or another bone, in the case of a joint.
      Hyponyms: tooth socket, alveolar socket, dental alveolus, dry socket; eye socket, eye-socket, orbital cavity, orbit
    3. The socket head for a socket wrench.
    4. A hollow tool for grasping and lifting tools dropped in a well-boring.
    5. The hollow of a candlestick.
      • 1671, Thomas Watson, The Beatitudes, page 8:
        Chriſt calls his Miniſters, Lux Mundi, the light of the World, Matth. 5. 14. therefore they must be alwayes giving forth their luſtre; their light must not go out till it be in the ſocket or till violent death as an extinguisher put it out.
      • 1856, L. S. Lavenu, chapter XXXIII, in Erlesmere; or, Contrasts of Character‎[1], volume 1, London: Smith, Elder & Co., page 336:
        The candle burned to its socket, the fire went out, the night air grew heavy with silence, before Herbert lay down.
  2. (computing) One endpoint of a two-way communication link, used for interprocess communication across a network.
    Synonym: network socket
  3. (computing) One endpoint of a two-way named pipe on Unix and Unix-like systems, used for interprocess communication.
  4. A steel apparatus attached to a saddle to protect the thighs and legs.

mechanical opening

hollow in a bone

socket (third-person singular simple present sockets, present participle socketing, simple past and past participle socketed)

  1. To place or fit in a socket.
    • 1941, Emily Carr, chapter 6, in Klee Wyck‎[2]:
      Her head and trunk were carved out of, or rather into, the bole of a great red cedar. She seemed to be part of the tree itself, as if she had grown there at its heart, and the carver had only chipped away the outer wood so that you could see her. Her arms were spliced and socketed to the trunk, and were flung wide in a circling, compelling movement.

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