The Collaborative Dictionary

Web \Web\, n. [OE. webbe, AS. webba. See Weave.] A weaver. [Obs.] --Chaucer. [1913 Webster]

Web \Web\, n. [OE. web, AS. webb; akin to D. web, webbe, OHG. weppi, G. gewebe, Icel. vefr, Sw. v[aum]f, Dan. v[ae]v. See Weave.] [1913 Webster]

That which is woven; a texture; textile fabric; esp., something woven in a loom. [1913 Webster] Penelope, for her Ulysses' sake, Devised a web her wooers to deceive. --Spenser. [1913 Webster] Not web might be woven, not a shuttle thrown, or penalty of exile. --Bancroft. [1913 Webster]

A whole piece of linen cloth as woven. [1913 Webster]

The texture of very fine thread spun by a spider for catching insects at its prey; a cobweb. "The smallest spider's web." --Shak. [1913 Webster]

Fig.: Tissue; texture; complicated fabrication. [1913 Webster] The somber spirit of our forefathers, who wove their web of life with hardly a . . . thread of rose-color or gold. --Hawthorne. [1913 Webster] Such has been the perplexing ingenuity of commentators that it is difficult to extricate the truth from the web of conjectures. --W. Irving. [1913 Webster]

(Carriages) A band of webbing used to regulate the extension of the hood. [1913 Webster]

A thin metal sheet, plate, or strip, as of lead. [1913 Webster] And Christians slain roll up in webs of lead. --Fairfax. [1913 Webster] Specifically: [1913 Webster] (a) The blade of a sword. [Obs.] [1913 Webster] The sword, whereof the web was steel, Pommel rich stone, hilt gold. --Fairfax. [1913 Webster] (b) The blade of a saw. [1913 Webster] (c) The thin, sharp part of a colter. [1913 Webster] (d) The bit of a key. [1913 Webster]

(Mach. & Engin.) A plate or thin portion, continuous or perforated, connecting stiffening ribs or flanges, or other parts of an object. Specifically: [1913 Webster] (a) The thin vertical plate or portion connecting the upper and lower flanges of an lower flanges of an iron girder, rolled beam, or railroad rail. [1913 Webster] (b) A disk or solid construction serving, instead of spokes, for connecting the rim and hub, in some kinds of car wheels, sheaves, etc. [1913 Webster] (c) The arm of a crank between the shaft and the wrist. [1913 Webster] (d) The part of a blackmith's anvil between the face and the foot. [1913 Webster]

(Med.) Pterygium; -- called also webeye. --Shak. [1913 Webster]

(Anat.) The membrane which unites the fingers or toes, either at their bases, as in man, or for a greater part of their length, as in many water birds and amphibians. [1913 Webster]

(Zool.) The series of barbs implanted on each side of the shaft of a feather, whether stiff and united together by barbules, as in ordinary feathers, or soft and separate, as in downy feathers. See Feather. [1913 Webster] [1913 Webster] Pin and web (Med.), two diseases of the eye, caligo and pterygium; -- sometimes wrongly explained as one disease. See Pin, n., 8, and Web, n.,

"He never yet had pinne or webbe, his sight for to decay." --Gascoigne. Web member (Engin.), one of the braces in a web system. Web press, a printing press which takes paper from a roll instead of being fed with sheets. Web system (Engin.), the system of braces connecting the flanges of a lattice girder, post, or the like. [1913 Webster]

web \web\ (w[e^]b), n. The world-wide web; -- usually referred to as the web. [PJC]

Web \Web\ (w[e^]b), v. t. [imp. & p. p. Webbed; p. pr. & vb. n. Webbing.] To unite or surround with a web, or as if with a web; to envelop; to entangle. [1913 Webster]

Word Net

web

1 an intricate network suggesting something that was formed by weaving or interweaving; "the trees cast a delicate web of shadows over the lawn"

2 an intricate trap that entangles or ensnares its victim [syn: entanglement]

3 the flattened weblike part of a feather consisting of a series of barbs on either side of the shaft [syn: vane]

4 an interconnected system of things or people; "he owned a network of shops"; "retirement meant dropping out of a whole network of people who had been part of my life"; "tangled in a web of cloth" [syn: network]

5 computer network consisting of a collection of internet sites that offer text and graphics and sound and animation resources through the hypertext transfer protocol [syn: World Wide Web, WWW]

6 a fabric (especially a fabric in the process of being woven)

7 membrane connecting the toes of some aquatic birds and mammals v : construct or form a web, as if by weaving [syn: net] [also: webbing, webbed]

Moby Thesaurus

anatomy, animal fiber, arabesque, architectonics, architecture, arrangement, artificial fiber, basketry, basketwork, bed, braid, braiding, build, building, cancellation, capillament, cilium, cirrus, cloth, cobweb, complexity, complication, composition, conformation, constitution, construction, creation, cross-hatching, crossing-out, cylinder press, denier, drapery, embroilment, enlace, enlacement, enmeshment, ensnarement, entanglement, entrapment, entwine, entwinement, entwining, etoffe, fabric, fabrication, fashion, fashioning, felt, fiber, fibrilla, filament, filamentule, filigree, flagellum, flatbed cylinder press, forging, form, format, formation, frame, fret, fretwork, getup, goods, gossamer, grate, grating, grid, gridiron, grille, grillwork, hachure, hair, hank, hatching, interknit, interknitting, interlace, interlacement, interlacery, interlacing, intertexture, interthreading, intertie, intertieing, intertissue, intertwine, intertwinement, intertwining, intertwist, intertwisting, interweave, interweavement, interweaving, intort, involvement, jungle, knit, knitting, knot, labyrinth, lace, lacery, lacework, lacing, lattice, latticework, loom, loop, make, makeready, makeup, making, manufacture, mat, material, maze, mesh, meshes, meshwork, mold, molding, morass, napery, net, netting, network, noose, organic structure, organism, organization, pattern, patterning, physique, plait, plaiting, plan, platen, platen press, pleach, plexure, plexus, press, presswork, printing machine, printing press, production, raddle, rag, reticle, reticulation, reticule, reticulum, riddle, rotary press, rotogravure press, screen, screening, setup, shape, shaping, sieve, silk, skein, snarl, splice, strand, structure, structuring, stuff, suture, tangle, tectonics, tendril, textile, textile fabric, texture, thread, threadlet, tissu, tissue, toils, tracery, trellis, trelliswork, twill, twine, twining, twist, twisting, warp and woof, warpage, wattle, weave, weaving, web press, webbing, webwork, weft, weftage, wicker, wickerwork, woof, wool, wreathe, wreathing

English

Etymology

webb

Pronunciation

• /wɛb/
• Rhymes with: -ɛb

Noun

1. The silken structure a spider builds using silk secreted from the spinnerets at the caudal tip of its abdomen; a spiderweb.

   The sunlight glistened in the dew on the web.

2. Any interconnected set of persons, places, or things, which when diagrammed resembles a spider's web.
3. Specifically, the World Wide Web (also spelled Web).

   Let me search the web for that.

4. The part of a baseball mitt between the forefinger and thumb, the webbing.

   He caught the ball in the web.

5. A latticed or woven structure.

   The gazebo's roof was a web made of thin strips of wood.

6. The interconnection between flanges in structural members, increasing the effective lever arm and so the load capacity of the member.
7. The thinner vertical section of a railway rail between the top (head) and bottom (foot) of the rail.
8. A fold of tissue connecting the toes of certain birds.

   A duck paddles with its webbed feet.

9. In the context of "manufacturing": A continuous strip of material carried by rollers during processing.
10. In the context of "lithography": A long sheet of paper which is fed from a roll into a printing press, as opposed to individual sheets of paper.

Derived terms

• cobweb
• spiderweb
• webbed
• webbing

Translations

• Azeri: tor
• Cebuano: lawâ
• Chinese: 网 (wăng)
• Estonian: võrk
• Finnish: seitti
• French: toile
• German: Netz
• Japanese: 蜘蛛の巣 (kumo no su)
• Norwegian: nett, vev
• Persian: تار عنکبوت
• Russian: [сеть] (set')
• Turkish: ağ
• Ukrainian: мережа (merezha)
• Welsh: gwe

Verb

1. to construct or form a web
2. to cover with a web or network
3. to ensnare or entangle
4. to provide with a web

Translations

• Norwegian: nettverke

Web may refer to:

Biology

• Spider web, a mesh built by a spider, composed of spider silk and usually used for catching prey like flys and other insects

Computing

• WEB, a computer programming system created by Donald Knuth to implement literate programming
• World Wide Web or "the Web", a hypertext system that operates over the Internet, used for serving Web pages and transferring files
  • WorldWideWeb, the world's first Web browser
  • Web.com, a public company that offers websites and other services for small businesses and consumers
  • Web 2.0, a perceived transition of the Web from a collection of Web sites to a full-fledged computing platform serving Web applications
• WEB is the abbreviation of the sentence World Electronic Broadcast

Publications

• The Web (comics), comic book published by Archie Comics
• Web (Novel) by John Wyndham, posthumously published novel set on an island populated by spiders
• World English Bible(WEB), a public domain translation of the Bible
• The Web (series), a series of science fiction stories

Television and film

• The Web (film), a film noir
• Web (Law & Order: Special Victims Unit), an episode of Law & Order: Special Victims Unit
• Web Entertainment, a record label
• Webs (film), a 2003 Sci-fi movie

Miscellaneous

• A structure that joins with other component parts
• Offset printing web, a roll of paper is used, rather than individual pages
• Steel I-beams or trusses are made with a web, centered between the top and bottom flange
• Web Entertainment, a discography label owned by the Bass Brothers
• Web (manufacturing) continuous sheets of material passed over rollers
• Nets Webs and the Information Infrastructure

See also

• Webb