different between commit vs dabble

English

Etymology

Borrowed from Latin committ? (“to bring together, join, compare, commit (a wrong), incur, give in charge, etc.”), from com- (“together”) + mitt? (“to send”). See mission.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /k??m?t/
• Rhymes: -?t
• Hyphenation: com?mit

Verb

commit (third-person singular simple present commits, present participle committing, simple past and past participle committed)

1. (transitive) To give in trust; to put into charge or keeping; to entrust; to consign; used with to or formerly unto.
2. (transitive) To put in charge of a jailer; to imprison.
3. (transitive) To have (a person) enter an establishment, such as a hospital or asylum, as a patient.

4. (transitive) To do (something bad); to perpetrate, as a crime, sin, or fault.
5. To join a contest; to match; followed by with.

   (Can we find and add a quotation of Dr. H. More to this entry?)

6. (transitive, intransitive) To pledge or bind; to compromise, expose, or endanger by some decisive act or preliminary step. (Traditionally used only reflexively but now also without oneself etc.)
   • 8 March, 1769, Junius, letter to the Duke of Grafton

     You might have satisfied every duty of political friendship, without committing the honour of your sovereign.

   • 1803, John Marshall, The Life of George Washington

     Any sudden assent to the proposal […] might possibly be considered as committing the faith of the United States.

7. (transitive, computing) To make a set of changes permanent.
8. (transitive, obsolete, Latinism) To confound.
9. (obsolete, intransitive) To commit an offence; especially, to fornicate.
10. (obsolete, intransitive) To be committed or perpetrated; to take place; to occur.

Usage notes

To commit, entrust, consign. These words have in common the idea of transferring from oneself to the care and custody of another. Commit is the widest term, and may express only the general idea of delivering into the charge of another; as, to commit a lawsuit to the care of an attorney; or it may have the special sense of entrusting with or without limitations, as to a superior power, or to a careful servant, or of consigning, as to writing or paper, to the flames, or to prison. To entrust denotes the act of committing to the exercise of confidence or trust; as, to entrust a friend with the care of a child, or with a secret. To consign is a more formal act, and regards the thing transferred as placed chiefly or wholly out of one's immediate control; as, to consign a pupil to the charge of his instructor; to consign goods to an agent for sale; to consign a work to the press.

Derived terms

• commit suicide
• commit to memory

Related terms

• commission
• commitment
• committal
• committee
• noncommittal
• mission

Translations

References

Further reading

• commit in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, G. & C. Merriam, 1913.
• commit in The Century Dictionary, New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911.

Noun

commit (plural commits)

1. (computing) The act of committing (e.g. a database transaction or source code into a source control repository), making it a permanent change.

Translations

French

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /k?.mi/

Verb

commit

1. third-person singular past historic of commettre

English

Etymology

From earlier dable, equivalent to dab +? -le (frequentative suffix), possibly from Middle Dutch dabbelen (“to pinch; knead; to fumble; to dabble”); cognate with Icelandic dafla (“to dabble”).

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /?dæb(?)l/
• (General American) IPA^(key): /?dæb?l/
• Rhymes: -æb?l
• Hyphenation: dab?ble

Verb

dabble (third-person singular simple present dabbles, present participle dabbling, simple past and past participle dabbled)

1. (transitive) To make slightly wet or soiled by spattering or sprinkling a liquid (such as water, mud, or paint) on it; to bedabble. [from late 16th c.]
2. (transitive) To cause splashing by moving a body part like a bill or limb in soft mud, water, etc., often playfully; to play in shallow water; to paddle.
3. (intransitive, figuratively) To participate or have an interest in an activity in a casual or superficial way.
4. (intransitive, obsolete) To interfere or meddle in; to tamper with.

Synonyms

• (to make slightly wet or soiled): bespatter, besprinkle, spatter

Derived terms

• bedabble
• dabbler
• dabblesome
• dabbling (noun)
• dabbling duck

Translations

See also

• dribble

Noun

dabble (plural dabbles)

1. A spattering or sprinkling of a liquid.
2. An act of splashing in soft mud, water, etc.
3. An act of participation in an activity in a casual or superficial way.

Translations

References

• John A. Simpson and Edward S. C. Weiner, editors (1989) , “dabble, v.”, in The Oxford English Dictionary, volume IV (Creel–Duzepere), 2nd edition, Oxford: Clarendon Press, ?ISBN, page 207, columns 2–3