engineers

1. 1
   noun

   Plural of engineer.

   The engineers designed a new cooling system for the factory.

   Software engineers worked through the night to debug the code.

   Note

   A plural that gathers very different people under one spelling. One thread is military: engineers are soldiers who build works for attack or defense, and were once also the gunners who worked the weapons. Civil engineers build bridges, harbors and railways; on a steamship the engineers ran the engine room; in the US the word can also mean fire-engine drivers. A modifier such as civil or software usually settles which is meant.

2. 2
   verb

   Third-person singular simple present of engineer.

   The committee engineers compromises whenever the talks stall.

   Their lead designer engineers solutions to complex water-supply problems.

   Note

   The verb form keeps both faces of its verb, honest building and quiet contrivance. With an object it may be neutral (a firm engineers a bridge, a lab engineers a DNA sequence) or faintly suspicious, as when someone engineers a meeting by guile. Without an object it leans toward plotting; the sense 'works as an engineer' is rare. A singular subject separates it from the plural noun of the same spelling.

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