channel
from
WordNet (r) 3.0 (2006)
channel
n 1: a path over which electrical signals can pass; "a channel
is typically what you rent from a telephone company" [syn:
{channel}, {transmission channel}]
2: a passage for water (or other fluids) to flow through; "the
fields were crossed with irrigation channels"; "gutters
carried off the rainwater into a series of channels under the
street"
3: a long narrow furrow cut either by a natural process (such as
erosion) or by a tool (as e.g. a groove in a phonograph
record) [syn: {groove}, {channel}]
4: a deep and relatively narrow body of water (as in a river or
a harbor or a strait linking two larger bodies) that allows
the best passage for vessels; "the ship went aground in the
channel"
5: (often plural) a means of communication or access; "it must
go through official channels"; "lines of communication were
set up between the two firms" [syn: {channel}, {communication
channel}, {line}]
6: a bodily passage or tube lined with epithelial cells and
conveying a secretion or other substance; "the tear duct was
obstructed"; "the alimentary canal"; "poison is released
through a channel in the snake's fangs" [syn: {duct},
{epithelial duct}, {canal}, {channel}]
7: a television station and its programs; "a satellite TV
channel"; "surfing through the channels"; "they offer more
than one hundred channels" [syn: {channel}, {television
channel}, {TV channel}]
8: a way of selling a company's product either directly or via
distributors; "possible distribution channels are wholesalers
or small retailers or retail chains or direct mailers or your
own stores" [syn: {distribution channel}, {channel}]
v 1: transmit or serve as the medium for transmission; "Sound
carries well over water"; "The airwaves carry the sound";
"Many metals conduct heat" [syn: {impart}, {conduct},
{transmit}, {convey}, {carry}, {channel}]
2: direct the flow of; "channel information towards a broad
audience" [syn: {channel}, {canalize}, {canalise}]
3: send from one person or place to another; "transmit a
message" [syn: {transmit}, {transfer}, {transport},
{channel}, {channelize}, {channelise}]
from
The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48
Channel \Chan"nel\ (ch[a^]n"n[e^]l), n. [OE. chanel, canel, OF.
chanel, F. chenel, fr. L. canalis. See {Canal}.]
1. The hollow bed where a stream of water runs or may run.
[1913 Webster]
2. The deeper part of a river, harbor, strait, etc., where
the main current flows, or which affords the best and
safest passage for vessels.
[1913 Webster]
3. (Geog.) A strait, or narrow sea, between two portions of
lands; as, the British Channel.
[1913 Webster]
4. That through which anything passes; a means of passing,
conveying, or transmitting; as, the news was conveyed to
us by different channels.
[1913 Webster]
The veins are converging channels. --Dalton.
[1913 Webster]
At best, he is but a channel to convey to the
National assembly such matter as may import that
body to know. --Burke.
[1913 Webster]
5. A gutter; a groove, as in a fluted column.
[1913 Webster]
6. pl. [Cf. {Chain wales}.] (Naut.) Flat ledges of heavy
plank bolted edgewise to the outside of a vessel, to
increase the spread of the shrouds and carry them clear of
the bulwarks.
[1913 Webster]
7. pl. official routes of communication, especially the
official means by which information should be transmitted
in a bureaucracy; as, to submit a request through
channels; you have to go through channels.
[PJC]
8. a band of electromagnetic wave frequencies that is used
for one-way or two-way radio communication; especially,
the frequency bands assigned by the FTC for use in
television broadcasting, and designated by a specific
number; as, channel 2 in New York is owned by CBS.
[PJC]
9. one of the signals in an electronic device which receives
or sends more than one signal simultaneously, as in
stereophonic radios, records, or CD players, or in
measuring equipment which gathers multiple measurements
simultaneously.
[PJC]
10. (Cell biology) an opening in a cell membrane which serves
to actively transport or allow passive transport of
substances across the membrane; as, an ion channel in a
nerve cell.
[PJC]
11. (Computers) a path for transmission of signals between
devices within a computer or between a computer and an
external device; as, a DMA channel.
[PJC]
{Channel bar}, {Channel iron} (Arch.), an iron bar or beam
having a section resembling a flat gutter or channel.
{Channel bill} (Zool.), a very large Australian cuckoo
({Scythrops Nov[ae]hollandi[ae]}.
{Channel goose}. (Zool.) See {Gannet}.
[1913 Webster]
from
Jargon File (4.4.4, 14 Aug 2003)
channel
n.
[IRC] The basic unit of discussion on {IRC}. Once one joins a channel,
everything one types is read by others on that channel. Channels are
named with strings that begin with a `#' sign and can have topic
descriptions (which are generally irrelevant to the actual subject of
discussion). Some notable channels are #initgame, #hottub, callahans,
and #report. At times of international crisis, #report has hundreds of
members, some of whom take turns listening to various news services
and typing in summaries of the news, or in some cases, giving
first-hand accounts of the action (e.g., Scud missile attacks in Tel
Aviv during the Gulf War in 1991).
from
The Free On-line Dictionary of Computing (8 July 2008)
channel
chat room
room
<chat> (Or "chat room", "room", depending on the system in
question) The basic unit of group discussion in {chat} systems
like {IRC}. Once one joins a channel, everything one types is
read by others on that channel. Channels can either be named
with numbers or with strings that begin with a "#" sign and
can have topic descriptions (which are generally irrelevant to
the actual subject of discussion).
Some notable channels are "#initgame", "#hottub" and
"#report". At times of international crisis, "#report" has
hundreds of members, some of whom take turns listening to
various news services and typing in summaries of the news, or
in some cases, giving first-hand accounts of the action
(e.g. Scud missile attacks in Tel Aviv during the Gulf War in
1991).
[{Jargon File}]
(1998-01-25)
from
Easton's 1897 Bible Dictionary
Channel
(1.) The bed of the sea or of a river (Ps. 18:15; Isa. 8:7).
(2.) The "chanelbone" (Job 31:22 marg.), properly "tube" or
"shaft," an old term for the collar-bone.
from
Moby Thesaurus II by Grady Ward, 1.0
248 Moby Thesaurus words for "channel":
EDP, access, adolescent stream, adviser, aisle, alley,
amateur band, ambulatory, announcer, annunciator, aperture,
approach, approaches, aqueduct, arcade, arroyo, artery, authority,
avenue, band, basin, beck, bed, bit, blowhole, bottleneck, bottom,
bourn, braided stream, branch, brook, brooklet, burn, canal,
canalization, canalize, carry, carve, chamfer, channelize, chisel,
chute, citizens band, cloister, colonnade, communicant,
communication, communication explosion, communication theory,
communicator, conduct, conduit, connection, convey, corridor,
corrugate, coulee, course, covered way, crack, creek, crick, crimp,
cut, dado, data retrieval, data storage, debouch, decoding, defile,
dike, direct, ditch, door, duct, egress,
electronic data processing, emunctory, encoding, engrave,
enlightener, entrenchment, entropy, escape, estuary, exhaust, exit,
expert witness, fairway, ferry, floodgate, floor, flowing stream,
flume, flute, fluviation, ford, fosse, frequency band, fresh,
freshet, funnel, furrow, gallery, gash, gill, goffer, gossipmonger,
gouge, grapevine, groove, ground, guide, gully, gutter, ha-ha,
incise, informant, information center, information explosion,
information medium, information theory, informer, inlet,
interchange, intersection, interviewee, isthmus, junction, kennel,
kill, lane, lazy stream, lead, loophole, meandering stream, means,
medium, midchannel, midstream, millstream, moat, monitor,
mouthpiece, moving road, narrow, narrows, navigable river, neck,
newsmonger, noise, notifier, ocean bottom, opening, out, outcome,
outfall, outgate, outgo, outlet, overpass, pass, passage,
passageway, path, pipe, pipeline, pleat, plow, police band, pore,
port, portico, press, public relations officer, publisher,
put through, put through channels, rabbet, race, racing stream,
radio, radio channel, railroad tunnel, redundancy, reporter, rifle,
river, rivulet, road, run, rundle, runlet, runnel, rut, sally port,
score, scratch, sea lane, seaway, ship route, shortwave band,
signal, sike, siphon, slit, sluice, source, spill stream, spiracle,
spokesman, spout, standard band, steamer track, strait, streak,
stream, stream action, streamlet, striate, subterranean river,
sunk fence, tap, television, teller, throat, tipster, tout,
traject, trajet, transmit, trench, trough, tube, tunnel, underpass,
vent, ventage, venthole, vomitory, wadi, watercourse, waterway,
way, way out, weir, witness, wrinkle
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