delete

Formsdeletes, deleting, deleted

Pluraldeletes

1. 1
   verbtransitive

   To remove or erase something, especially written material or data stored on a computer or other device.

   The editor deleted three paragraphs from the article.

   You can delete any file you no longer need.

   Similarerase, remove, clear, strike

   Oppositeinsert, restore, maintain

   Note

   Behind the keystroke lies a Latin word for smudging. Latin dēlēre, "destroy, blot out", grew from dēlinere, "to erase by smearing", built on linere, "to smear, wipe". English has used the verb since about 1495, long before screens. In editing, its opposite is stet, the proofreader's "let it stand". Insert and restore undo a deletion in other ways, by adding text or bringing it back.

2. 2
   nouncountable

   An act of removing or erasing data or written material; a single deletion.

   Each delete in the manuscript was logged for later review.

   The software records every delete a user performs.

   Similardeletion, erasure

   Oppositeinsertion, addition

   Note

   Database programmers turn the verb into a count noun. A delete is one removal operation, and it takes a plural and modifiers like any other countable noun, as in "cascading updates and cascading deletes." It usually pairs with updates and inserts as a basic operation on stored records. Outside technical writing, deletion remains the ordinary noun, and a delete in general prose can sound like jargon.

3. 3
   noununcountable

   Alternative letter-case form of Delete.

   Tapping delete clears the character to the right of the cursor.

   She pressed delete and the highlighted file disappeared.

   Note

   In running text, the key's name is usually written in lowercase and used without an article: you press delete, much as you press enter. Its behavior is worth knowing. Backspace removes the character before the cursor, while delete erases forward, eating text from left to right. The capitalized form also covers the other noun meanings, from a single deletion to the control character.

4. 4
   verbslangtransitive

   To kill or murder someone.

   The hitman was paid to delete a business rival.

   Rumor spread that the cartel had deleted the informant.

   Similarkill, murder, eliminate, whack, waste

   Note

   Thriller dialogue is where this meaning lives. In Ted Bell's Assassin (2008), the order is simply to "find this guy… and delete him." Its cool detachment is the point, and characters sometimes need it translated. In Tim Corkery's Funny to Horror, a listener checks: "In other words I kill a terrorist, right?" Outside fiction and dark humor, the word sounds flippant about death.

5. 5
   verbslangtransitive

   To defeat or completely dominate an opponent.

   The champion deleted his rival in three straight games.

   With one perfect combo, you can delete the enemy team.

   Similardestroy, crush, demolish, annihilate, thrash

   Note

   Online gamers use it most often in the passive, from the loser's side. A 2020 post on the Blizzard Forums complains of getting "deleted by a rogue and druid who were both invisible and just popped up and cleaned me." The word suggests a defeat so sudden that nothing is left, the picture borrowed from the everyday erasing sense. It belongs to casual talk about play, not to formal reporting on matches.

6. 6
   nouncountable

   A control character, encoded as U+007F, originally used to mark a character for removal.

   The parser ignored every delete it encountered in the byte stream.

   A single delete at code point 127 marked the preceding character as void.

   Note

   A character that prints nothing and exists to be ignored. Its code point is U+007F, decimal 127, and it appears as %7F when percent-encoded in a web address. On paper tape, it was punched over unwanted characters to mark them for omission, which is how a character came to mean "skip this". Programs reading raw text may still need to filter it out.

7. 7
   nouncountable

   A copy of a music or video release that has been withdrawn from the catalog and sold off as surplus.

   Collectors hunt through delete bins for rare pressings.

   The label dumped thousands of unsold copies as deletes.

   Similarcutout, remainder

   Note

   Record-trade jargon turns a catalog decision into a thing. A title deleted from a label's list becomes, as leftover stock, a delete. Billboard used the word through the 1970s and 1980s, nearly always in the plural and usually as a worry. Canadian industry figures warned of "a flood of deletes" and counted them alongside imports. Unlike the computing noun, which names an act, this one names an object you can buy.

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