button
Part of speech: noun
verb
Morphological type: simple
Topics: aeronautics
aerospace
arts
aviation
ball-games
biology
botany
bowmaking
broadcasting
business
card-games
clothing
comedy
computing
crafts
curling
engineering
entertainment
fashion
fencing
games
glassblowing
government
graphical-user-interface
hobbies
lifestyle
lutherie
manufacturing
martial-arts
mathematics
media
military
natural-sciences
physical-sciences
poker
politics
sciences
sports
television
textiles
war
zoology
Etymology: From Middle English boton, botoun, from Old French boton (Modern French bouton), from Old French bouter, boter (“to push; thrust”), ultimately from a Germanic language. Doublet of bouton, Biden, and beat. More at butt.
Inflected forms:
form: buttons
pos: noun
tags: plural
form: btn
pos: noun
tags: alternative
form: buttons
pos: verb
tags: present
singular
third-person
form: buttoning
pos: verb
tags: participle
present
form: buttoned
pos: verb
tags: participle
past
form: buttoned
pos: verb
tags: past
form: btn
pos: verb
tags: alternative
Senses:
gloss: A knob or disc that is passed through a loop or (buttonhole), serving as a fastener.
pos: noun
examples: I liked the man for his own sake, and even had he promised to turn out a celebrity it would have had no weight with me. I look upon notoriety with the same indifference as on the buttons on a man's shirt-front, or the crest on his note-paper.
Rather should it be said that these ladies wore dress of military style, since there was nothing uniform about their outfits, one being in powder-blue with silver buttons and a forage-cap, the other in tan with gold buttons and the dinkiest of red-peaked kepis.
April fastened the buttons of her overcoat to keep out the wind.
gloss: A mechanical device designed to be pressed with a finger in order to open or close an electric circuit or to activate a mechanism.
pos: noun
examples: Pat pushed the button marked "shred" on the blender.
gloss: An on-screen control that can be selected as an activator of an attached function.
pos: noun
examples: Click the button that looks like a house to return to your browser's home page.
gloss: A badge worn on clothes, fixed with a pin through the fabric.
pos: noun
tags: US
examples: The politician wore a bright yellow button with the slogan "Vote Smart" emblazoned on it.
gloss: A bud.
pos: noun
examples: O queen Emilia, / Fresher than May, sweeter / Than her gold buttons on the boughs,
gloss: The calyx of an orange.
pos: noun
examples: Not well healed, or aggregating more than a circle 14 inch in diameter on a 200 size orange. More than a few adjacent to the "button" at the stem end or more than 6 scattered on other portions of the fruit.
gloss: The head of an unexpanded mushroom.
pos: noun
gloss: The clitoris.
pos: noun
tags: slang
gloss: The center (bullseye) of the house.
pos: noun
gloss: The soft circular tip at the end of a foil.
pos: noun
gloss: A plastic disk used to represent the person in last position in a poker game; also dealer's button.
pos: noun
gloss: The player who is last to act after the flop, turn and river, who possesses the button.
pos: noun
gloss: A person who acts as a decoy.
pos: noun
tags: archaic
gloss: A raised pavement marker to further indicate the presence of a pavement-marking painted stripe.
pos: noun
gloss: The end of a runway.
pos: noun
examples: In attempting to touch down on the button of the runway, he misjudged his altitude and struck a pile of rocks short of the runway. The right wheel was torn off and the gear leg bent backwards.
The second and slightly higher aircraft on the approach showed no reaction to this barrage of pyrotechnics and continued blissfully down toward the button of the runway.
gloss: A methaqualone tablet (used as a recreational drug).
pos: noun
tags: South-Africa
slang
gloss: A piece of wood or metal, usually flat and elongated, turning on a nail or screw, to fasten something, such as a door.
pos: noun
gloss: A globule of metal remaining on an assay cupel or in a crucible, after fusion.
pos: noun
gloss: A knob; a small ball; a small, roundish mass.
pos: noun
gloss: A small white blotch on a cat's coat.
pos: noun
gloss: A unit of length equal to ¹⁄₁₂ inch.
pos: noun
tags: UK
archaic
gloss: The means for initiating a nuclear strike or similar cataclysmic occurrence.
pos: noun
examples: Pandora's box of holocausts gracefully cruising satellite infested heavens, waiting, the season of the button, the penultimate migration, radioactive perfumes for the fashionably, for the terminally, insane.
It's Christmas at ground zero / The button has been pressed / The radio / Just let us know / That this is not a test
gloss: The oblate spheroidal mass of glass attaching a stem to either its bowl or foot.
pos: noun
gloss: In an instrument of the violin family, the near-semicircular shape extending from the top of the back plate of the instrument, meeting the heel of the neck.
pos: noun
gloss: Synonym of endbutton, part of a violin-family instrument.
pos: noun
gloss: Synonym of adjuster.
pos: noun
gloss: The least amount of care or interest; a whit or jot.
pos: noun
examples: 'She has heard from us this morning,' said Mr. Gamble, grinning on his watch, 'and she knows all by this time, and 'tisn't a button to her.'
As to that I did not care a button, but I had wanted to hear about Betty, and now her name was barely mentioned.
gloss: The punchy or suspenseful line of dialogue that concludes a scene.
pos: noun
examples: One thing you definitely don't want to do is write past the button. For example, a scene's natural button might run something like this:
TONY: That kind of talk is exactly what I'm talking about.
Whereas an example of writing past the button would sound something like this:
TONY: That kind of talk is exactly what I'm talking about.
CARMELLA: Okay. 'Bye.
TONY: Bye.
gloss: The final joke at the end of a comedic act (such as a sketch, set, or scene).
pos: noun
examples: Scenes usually go out on a laugh line, a stinger or a button. End your script with a twist!
With our show, one thing we wanted to do was give our best effort to always put a button on the scene.
Is there a best way to end a comedy sketch? Endings — or outs, or buttons as writers call them — are notoriously difficult to nail. The ideal ending needs to be satisfying and surprising while staying true to the comedic game that preceded it.
gloss: A button man; a professional assassin.
pos: noun
tags: slang
examples: FREDO: Mikey, why would they ever hit poor old Frankie Five-Angels? I loved that ole sonuvabitch. I remember when he was just a 'button,' when we were kids.
gloss: The final segment of a rattlesnake's rattle.
pos: noun
examples: Hardly a rattler is ever reported in the newspapers unless it is stated to have had "blank rattles and a button". But here button usually means the terminal lobe of the last rattle, even though the string may not be complete, the true button and additional rattles having been lost.
gloss: A clove (of garlic).
pos: noun
tags: Southern-US
dated
gloss: Pedicle; the attachment point for antlers in cervids.
pos: noun
gloss: To fasten with a button.
pos: verb
tags: transitive
examples: He was a tall, fat, long-bodied man, buttoned up to the throat in a tight green coat.
gloss: To be fastened by a button or buttons.
pos: verb
tags: intransitive
examples: The coat will not button.
gloss: To stop talking.
pos: verb
tags: informal
Related words: switch
toggle
trigger
Derived words: bachelor's button
bachelors button
Barbara's buttons
bebuttoned
beg button
beggar's buttons
bell button
belly-button
belly button
bellybutton
belly button ring
big red button
billy buttons
blow my buttons
blue button
boss button
boy in buttons
brass button
bright as a button
bright as a new button
button accordion
buttonball
button bar
button-basher
button basher
buttonbush
button cactus
button cell
button day
button ear
buttonfront
button grass
button hole
button-hole
buttonhole
buttonhook
buttonize
buttonless
button lift
buttonlike
button lock
buttonmaker
buttonmaking
button man
button mangrove
button mash
button masher
button-masher
button-mashing
button mashing
buttonmould
button mushroom
button nose
buttonologist
buttonology
button-on
button plant
button punch
button pusher
button-pusher
button quail
buttonquail
button-quail
button scurvy
button seal
button smuggler
button snakeroot
button spider
button squash
button stick
button-up
button up one's lip
buttonweed
buttonwillow
button willow
buttonwood
button wrinklewort
buttony
buzz button
call button
campaign button
care a button
cheese button
chest button
chicken button
chicory button
collar button
collar-button
collar-button abscess
cough button
cute as a button
diatonic button accordion
disbutton
Dorset button
electric button
endbutton
end-button
end button
face button
fire button
fussbutton
hamburger button
happy button
high button shoe
hit the button
hit the pause button
hold by the button
hot-button
hot button
hug button
keybutton
love button
meow button
multibutton
multibuttoned
Murphy's button
neat as a button
nuclear button
on the button
option button
panic button
placebo button
prebutton
press button
press someone's buttons
push-button
push button
pushbutton
push someone's buttons
push the right buttons
Quaker buttons
radial button
radio button
reset button
sew buttons
sew buttons on your underwear
shirt-button
sleeve-button
snooze button
spin button
Start button
stay-button
Szechuan button
tang button
thistle button
tich button
tummy button
turn button
wild bachelor's button
wild bachelor's-button
buttonable
button-down
buttoner
button it
button one's lip
button through
button up
misbutton
rebutton
unbutton
Translations:
lang: Spanish
word: abotonarse
lang: Spanish
word: abrocharse