Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • intransitive verb To cut into the surface of (glass, for example) by the action of acid, especially by coating the surface with wax or another protective layer and drawing lines with a needle and then using the acid to form the lines on the unprotected parts of the surface.
  • intransitive verb To make or create by this method.
  • intransitive verb To draw or write by cutting or scraping.
  • intransitive verb To cut or scrape something in or on.
  • intransitive verb To impress or delineate clearly.
  • intransitive verb To engage in etching.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • A dialectal or obsolete variant of eke.
  • noun A contracted form of eddish.
  • To cut or bite with an acid or mordant; specifically, to engrave by the use of a mordant: as, to etch a design on a copperplate: applied in the fine arts either to a design or to the plate upon which it is made. See etching.
  • To sketch; delineate.
  • To practise etching.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • transitive verb To produce, as figures or designs, on mental, glass, or the like, by means of lines or strokes eaten in or corroded by means of some strong acid.
  • transitive verb To subject to etching; to draw upon and bite with acid, as a plate of metal.
  • transitive verb rare To sketch; to delineate.
  • intransitive verb To practice etching; to make etchings.
  • noun obsolete A variant of eddish.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • verb To cut into a surface with an acid or other corrosive substance in order to make a pattern. Best known as a technique for creating printing plates, but also used for decoration on metal, and, in modern industry, to make circuit boards.
  • verb To engrave a surface.
  • verb figuratively To make a lasting impression.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • verb cause to stand out or be clearly defined or visible
  • verb make an etching of
  • verb carve or cut into a block used for printing or print from such a block
  • verb carve or cut a design or letters into
  • verb selectively dissolve the surface of (a semiconductor or printed circuit) with a solvent, laser, or stream of electrons

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Dutch etsen, from German ätzen, from Middle High German etzen, from Old High German ezzen, to eat; see ed- in Indo-European roots.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

Germanic, cognate with Dutch ets.

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Examples

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  • I think we view that etch, which is typically a 12\% to 13\% of wafer fab equipment.

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  • GNU/Linux 4.0 alias "etch" are automatically handled by the aptitude package management tool for most configurations, and to a certain degree also by the apt-get package management tool.

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  • What, is history some kind of etch-a-sketch, where you can shake it and we forget?

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  • GNU/Linux 4.0 alias "etch" are automatically handled by the aptitude package management tool for most configurations, and to a certain degree also by the apt-get package management tool.

    LinuxQuestions.org craigevil 2010

  • GNU/Linux 4.0 alias "etch" are automatically handled by the aptitude package management tool for most configurations, and to a certain degree also by the apt-get package management tool.

    LinuxQuestions.org 2010

  • What, is history some kind of etch-a-sketch, where you can shake it and we forget?

    Propeller Most Popular Stories 2010

  • What, is history some kind of etch-a-sketch, where you can shake it and we forget?

    Propeller Most Popular Stories 2010

  • Neomagic MagicGraph128XD graphics - apparently "Works perfectly with the NeoMagic Framebuffer Driver in the Kernel 2.6.12 using the following configuration (Debian GNU/Linux" etch "defaults):" according to ThinkWiki, and

    LinuxQuestions.org idiot96 2010

  • What, is history some kind of etch-a-sketch, where you can shake it and we forget?

    Propeller Most Popular Stories 2010

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