directly
Language: English
Part of speech: adv
Pronunciation: enpr: dĭ-rĕk(t)ˈ -lē
enpr: dī-rĕk(t)ˈ -lē
ipa: /dɪˈɹɛk(t)li/
ipa: /daɪˈɹɛk(t)li/
Forms: form: more directly
form: most directly
Etymology: From direct + -ly.
Senses: examples: text: He drove directly to the office, and didn't stop off at the petrol station.
text: On arriving at the doors, and entering a long, capacious passage, our eyes became quite dazzled by the gleams of colored light which shone upon them, both directly and reflectedly.
ref: 1855, William Wells Brown, Sketches of Places and People Abroad, page 255:
text: It is more difficult to directly compare train operations and maintenance, given how fragmented the non-infrastructure segments of the industry are today.
ref: 2023 March 8, Gareth Dennis, “The Reshaping of things to come...”, in RAIL, number 978, page 46:
glosses: In a direct manner; in a straight line or course.
examples: text: I'm sick of asking you to fire him; I'll just do it directly.
glosses: In a straightforward way; without anything intervening; not by secondary but by direct means.
examples: text: I'm going to tell Natalie directly that I love her.
text: To put it more directly: he's not 'made redundant' but sacked.
text: "Mujtahidd" has attracted almost 300,000 followers since the end of last year, when he began posting scandalous claims about the Saudi elite. In one tweet, Mujtahidd directly challenged Prince Abdul Aziz Bin Fahd about his political history: "Did you resign or were you forced to resign from your post as head of the diwan [office] of the council of ministers?"
ref: 2012 April 19, Josh Halliday, “Free speech haven or lawless cesspool – can the internet be civilised?”, in the Guardian:
glosses: Plainly, without circumlocution or ambiguity; absolutely; in express terms.
examples: text: It's directly across the street.
text: The ability of a segment of a glass sphere to magnify whatever is placed before it was known around the year 1000, when the spherical segment was called a reading stone,[…]. Scribes, illuminators, and scholars held such stones directly over manuscript pages as an aid in seeing what was being written, drawn, or read.
ref: 2013 September-October, Henry Petroski, “The Evolution of Eyeglasses”, in American Scientist:
glosses: Exactly; just; at the shortest possible distance.
examples: text: He told me directly that he'd cheated on me, and how sorry he was for it.
glosses: Straightforwardly; honestly.
glosses: Immediately.
examples: text: We'll go to the store directly, but first I need to finish sweeping.
glosses: Soon; next; in due time; as soon as it becomes convenient.
Synonyms: sense: in a straight line or course
word: straightwise
sense: in a straight line or course
word: undeviatingly
sense: without circumlocution or ambiguity
word: bluntly
word: clearly
word: downrightly
word: unambiguously
word: explicitly
sense: exactly, just
word: accurately
word: dead
word: precisely
word: slap bang
word: exactly
sense: straightforwardly, honestly
word: frankly
sense: straightforwardly, honestly
word: truthfully
sense: immediately
word: forthwith
word: now
word: tout de suite
word: immediately
sense: soon
word: betimes
word: in due course
word: presently
word: shortly
word: soon
Derived terms: directly proportional