different between cipher vs aught

English

Alternative forms

• (less common) cypher

Etymology

14th century. From Middle English cifre, from Old French cyfre, cyffre (French chiffre), ultimately from Arabic ?????? (?ifr, “zero, empty”), from ??????? (?afara, “to be empty”). Doublet of zero. Sense 9 may be a different word.

Pronunciation

• Hyphenation: ci?pher
• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /?sa?f?/
• (US, Canada) enPR: ?s?-f?r, IPA^(key): /?sa?f?/
• Rhymes: -a?f?(r)

Noun

cipher (plural ciphers)

1. A numeric character.
2. Any text character.

   • This understanding wisdom began to be written in ciphers and characters and letters bearing the forms of creatures.

3. A combination or interweaving of letters, as the initials of a name; a device; a monogram.

   a painter's cipher, an engraver's cipher, etc.

4. A method of transforming a text in order to conceal its meaning.

   The message was written in a simple cipher. Anyone could figure it out.

   • His father […] engaged him when he was very young to write all his letters to England in cipher.

5. (cryptography) A cryptographic system using an algorithm that converts letters or sequences of bits into ciphertext.
6. Ciphertext; a message concealed via a cipher.

   The message is clearly a cipher, but I can't figure it out.

7. A grouping of three digits in a number, especially when delimited by commas or periods:

   The probability is 1 in 1,000,000,000,000,000 — a number having five ciphers of zeros.

8. (music) A fault in an organ valve which causes a pipe to sound continuously without the key having been pressed.
9. A hip-hop jam session.
10. The path (usually circular) shared cannabis takes through a group, an occasion of cannabis smoking.
11. Someone or something of no importance; a nonentity

    • There he was a mere cipher.

12. (dated) Zero.

Synonyms

• (numeric character): number, numeral
• (method for concealing the meaning of text): code
• (cryptographic system using an algorithm):
• (ciphertext):
• (a grouping of three digits in a number, especially when delimited):
• (design of interlacing initials): monogram
• (fault in an organ valve causing a pipe to sound continuously):
• (hip-hop jam session):
• (path that shared cannabis takes through a group):
• (someone or something of no importance): (person): nobody, nonentity, see also Thesaurus:nonentity; (thing) nonentity, nothing, nullity
• (obsolete: zero): naught/nought, nothing, oh, zero

Derived terms

Related terms

• zero

Translations

Verb

cipher (third-person singular simple present ciphers, present participle ciphering, simple past and past participle ciphered)

1. (intransitive, regional, dated) To calculate.

   I never learned much more than how to read and cipher.

   • 1843, Thomas Carlyle, Past and Present, book 2, ch. IX, Abbot Samson

     For the mischief that one blockhead, that every blockhead does, in a world so feracious, teeming with endless results as ours, no ciphering will sum up.

   • 1979, Octavia Butler, Kindred:

     Can you cipher too—along with your reading and writing?

2. (intransitive) To write in code or cipher.
3. (intransitive, music) Of an organ pipe: to sound independent of the organ.
4. (obsolete) To decipher.

References

Anagrams

• ceriph, chipre, rechip

English

Pronunciation

• (UK) enPR: ôt, IPA^(key): /??t/
• Rhymes: -??t
• (US) enPR: ôt, IPA^(key): /?t/
• (cot–caught merger) enPR: ät, IPA^(key): /?t/

Etymology 1

From Middle English aught, ought, from Old English ?ht, from ? (“always", "ever”) + wiht (“thing", "creature”). More at aye, wight.

Alternative forms

• owt

Pronoun

aught

1. anything whatsoever, any part.
   • 1596-97, William Shakespeare, The Merchant of Venice, Act II, Scene ii^[1]:

     [...] wouldst thou aught with me?

   • But go, my son, and see if aught be wanting.

   • 1748. David Hume. Enquiries concerning the human understanding and concerning the principles of moral. London, Oxford University Press, 1973. § 29.

     […] to other objects, which for aught we know, may be only in appearance similar.

   • 1886-88, Richard F. Burton, The Supplemental Nights to the Thousand Nights and a Night:

     But as soon as her son espied her, bowl in hand, he thought that haply something untoward had befallen her, but he would not ask of aught until such time as she had set down the bowl, when she acquainted him with that which had occurred […]

   • 1912: Edgar Rice Burroughs, Tarzan of the Apes, chapter 5

     His life among these fierce apes had been happy; for his recollection held no other life, nor did he know that there existed within the universe aught else than his little forest and the wild jungle animals with which he was familiar.

   • 1977: J. R. R. Tolkien, Silmarillion, Ainulindalë

     There was Eru, the One, who in Arda is called Ilúvatar; and he made first the Ainur, the Holy Ones, that were the offspring of his thought, and they were with him before aught else was made.

Adverb

aught (not comparable)

1. (archaic) At all, in any degree, in any respect.
   • 1599, William Shakespeare, Much Ado About Nothing, act 5 scene 1

     [...] and if your love

     Can labour aught in sad invention,

     Hang her an epitaph upon her tomb,

     And sing it to her bones [...]

References

• aught in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, G. & C. Merriam, 1913.

Etymology 2

Meaning of "zero" by confusion with naught. Used amongst those who were once called "non-U" speakers of English.

Noun

aught (plural aughts)

1. whit, the smallest part, iota.
2. (archaic) zero
3. The digit zero as the decade in years. For example, aught-nine for 1909 or 2009.

Usage notes

The use of aught and ought to mean "zero" is very much proscribed as the word aught originally meant the opposite of naught: "anything". This may be due to misanalysis, or may simply be the result of speakers confusing the meanings of aught and naught due to similar-sounding phonemes.

Translations

See also

• naught
• owt

Etymology 3

From Middle English aught (“estimation, regard, reputation”), from Old English æht (“estimation, consideration”), from Proto-West Germanic *ahtu. Cognate with Dutch acht (“attention, regard, heed”), German Acht (“attention, regard”). Also see ettle.

Noun

aught (uncountable)

1. (regional) Estimation.

2. (regional) Of importance or consequence (in the phrase "of aught").

3. (regional, rare, obsolete) Esteem, respect.

Usage notes

In the first sense, generally found in the phrase "in one's aught" as in? "In my aught, this play ain't worth the candle". In the second sense, generally found in the phrase "of aught" as in? "nothing of aught has happened since you've been away, Sir". In the third sense, generally found in the phrase "a man of aught", or rarely in the more archaic phrase "to show somebody or something (some) aught" as in? "show your mother some aught, son".

References

• www.duden.de - Acht
• The Middle English Dictionary
• The Dictionary of the Scots Language
• The Dictionary of the Scots Language

Etymology 4

From Middle English aught, ought, from Old English ?ht, from Proto-Germanic *aihtiz (“possessions, property”).

Alternative forms

• ought

Noun

aught (plural aughts)

1. Property; possession
2. Duty; place; office

Verb

aught (third-person singular simple present aughts, present participle aughting, simple past and past participle aughted)

1. to own, possess
2. to owe, be obliged or obligated to

Adjective

aught (comparative more aught, superlative most aught)

1. possessed of

Etymology 5

From Middle English ahte, from Old English eahta (“eight”). More at eight.

Numeral

aught

1. Obsolete or dialectal form of eight.

Anagrams

• ghaut

Yola

Etymology

From Middle English ought.

Pronoun

aught

1. any, anything

References

• Jacob Poole (1867) , William Barnes, editor, A glossary, with some pieces of verse, of the old dialect of the English colony in the baronies of Forth and Bargy, County of Wexford, Ireland, J. Russell Smith, ?ISBN