different between focus vs gather

English

Etymology

Borrowed from Latin focus (“hearth, fireplace”); see there for more.

Pronunciation

• (UK) IPA^(key): /?f??.k?s/
• (US) IPA^(key): /?fo?.k?s/
• Rhymes: -??k?s

Noun

focus (countable and uncountable, plural foci or focuses or focusses)

1. (countable, optics) A point at which reflected or refracted rays of light converge.

2. (countable, geometry) A point of a conic at which rays reflected from a curve or surface converge.
3. (uncountable, photography, cinematography) The fact of the convergence of light on the photographic medium.

4. (uncountable, photography, cinematography) The quality of the convergence of light on the photographic medium.

5. (uncountable) Concentration of attention.

6. (countable, seismology) The exact point of where an earthquake occurs, in three dimensions (underneath the epicentre).

7. (graphical user interface) The indicator of the currently active element in a user interface.

8. (linguistics) The most important word or phrase in a sentence or passage, or the one that imparts information.
9. An object used in casting a magic spell.
   • 2004, Marian Singer, Trish MacGregor, The Only Wiccan Spell Book You'll Ever Need

     Candles, in fact, are an essential ingredient in many spells. They can be used as either the focus of the spell or as a component that sets the spell's overall mood and tone.

   • 2014, Kristen S. Walker, Witch Gate (page 180)

     I ran through what I knew about spells from Mom and other witchcraft sources, but nothing matched what I was used to seeing in her magic work. Usually she used herbs and other plants as a focus for the spell.

Derived terms

• focus hunting

Translations

Verb

focus (third-person singular simple present focuses or focusses, present participle focusing or focussing, simple past and past participle focused or focussed)

1. (intransitive, followed by on or upon) To concentrate during a task.

2. (transitive) To direct attention, effort, or energy to a particular audience or task.

3. (transitive) To cause (rays of light, etc) to converge at a single point.
4. (transitive) To adjust (a lens, an optical instrument) in order to position an image with respect to the focal plane.

   You'll need to focus the microscope carefully in order to capture the full detail of this surface.

5. (intransitive) To concentrate one’s attention.

   If you're going to beat your competitors, you need to focus.

6. (computing, graphical user interface, transitive) To transfer the input focus to (a visual element), so that it receives subsequent input.

   The text box won't receive the user's keystrokes unless you explicitly focus it.

Usage notes

The spellings focusses, focussing, focussed are more common in Commonwealth English than in American English, but in both varieties they are less common than the spellings focuses, focusing, focused.

Derived terms

• focus group
• in focus
• out of focus
• soft focus

Related terms

• focal

Translations

Anagrams

• Fusco

Catalan

Etymology

Borrowed from Latin focus. Compare the inherited doublet foc.

Pronunciation

• (Balearic, Central, Valencian) IPA^(key): /?f?.kus/

Noun

focus m (plural focus)

1. focus

Dutch

Etymology

Borrowed from New Latin focus. The figurative sense probably derives from English focus.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /?fo?.k?s/
• Hyphenation: fo?cus

Noun

focus m (plural focussen)

1. (optics, physics) focus

   Synonym: brandpunt

2. (figuratively) focus, centre

3. (linguistics) focus

Derived terms

• focaal
• focusafstand
• focussen

Related terms

• foyer

Descendants

• Afrikaans: fokus

References

Italian

Etymology

Borrowed from Latin focus, whence also Italian fuoco (an inherited doublet).

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /?f?.kus/
• Hyphenation: fò?cus

Noun

focus m (invariable)

1. focus (all senses)

Latin

Etymology

• The origin is uncertain. Usually connected with Old Armenian ??? (boc?).
• Some connect this along with faci?s, fac?tus, fax to Proto-Indo-European *b?eh?- (“to shine”). In that case, cognate at the root level with Sanskrit ???? (bh??ti), Ancient Greek ????? (phaín?, “to shine”), etc.
• In explaining how Kepler discovered the elliptical orbits, Nicholas Mee provides this explanation:

"One of the interesting properties of an ellipse is that if there were a light bulb at one focus, then all the light that it emits would reflect off the ellipse and converge at the other focus. This is why Kepler originally used the name focus for these points." (Gravity, 2014, p. 74)

Pronunciation

• (Classical) IPA^(key): /?fo.kus/, [?f?k?s?]
• (Ecclesiastical) IPA^(key): /?fo.kus/, [?f??kus]

Noun

focus m (genitive foc?); second declension

1. fireplace, hearth
2. firepan, coal pan, brazier
3. (figuratively) house, family
4. (Vulgar Latin) fire

Declension

Second-declension noun.

Derived terms

Related terms

• focillare
• foculare

Synonyms

• (fire): ignis

Descendants

References

• focus in Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short (1879) A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
• focus in Charlton T. Lewis (1891) An Elementary Latin Dictionary, New York: Harper & Brothers
• focus in Charles du Fresne du Cange’s Glossarium Mediæ et Infimæ Latinitatis (augmented edition, 1883–1887)
• focus in Gaffiot, Félix (1934) Dictionnaire illustré Latin-Français, Hachette
• Carl Meissner; Henry William Auden (1894) Latin Phrase-Book?^[1], London: Macmillan and Co.
• focus in Harry Thurston Peck, editor (1898) Harper's Dictionary of Classical Antiquities, New York: Harper & Brothers
• focus in William Smith et al., editor (1890) A Dictionary of Greek and Roman Antiquities, London: William Wayte. G. E. Marindin

English

Alternative forms

• gether (obsolete or regional)

Etymology

From Middle English gaderen, from Old English gaderian (“to gather, assemble”), from Proto-West Germanic *gadur?n (“to bring together, unite, gather”), from Proto-Indo-European *g?ed?- (“to unite, assemble, keep”).

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /??æð?/
• (General American) IPA^(key): /??æð?/
• Rhymes: -æð?(?)

Verb

gather (third-person singular simple present gathers, present participle gathering, simple past and past participle gathered)

1. To collect; normally separate things.
   1. Especially, to harvest food.

   2. To accumulate over time, to amass little by little.

   3. (intransitive) To congregate, or assemble.
      • ?, Alfred Tennyson, Tears

        Tears from the depth of some divine despair / Rise in the heart, and gather to the eyes.

   4. (intransitive) To grow gradually larger by accretion.

      • Their snow-ball did not gather as it went.

2. To bring parts of a whole closer.
   1. (sewing) To add pleats or folds to a piece of cloth, normally to reduce its width.

   2. (knitting) To bring stitches closer together.

   3. (architecture) To bring together, or nearer together, in masonry, as for example where the width of a fireplace is rapidly diminished to the width of the flue.
   4. (nautical) To haul in; to take up.

3. To infer or conclude; to know from a different source.

4. (intransitive, medicine, of a boil or sore) To be filled with pus

5. (glassblowing) To collect molten glass on the end of a tool.
6. To gain; to win.

Synonyms

• (to bring together): aggroup, togetherize; see also Thesaurus:round up

  (—to accumulate over time): accrue, add up; see also Thesaurus:accumulate

  (—to congregate): assemble, begather; see also Thesaurus:assemble

Derived terms

Translations

Noun

gather (plural gathers)

1. A plait or fold in cloth, made by drawing a thread through it; a pucker.
2. The inclination forward of the axle journals to keep the wheels from working outward.
3. The soffit or under surface of the masonry required in gathering. See gather (transitive verb).
4. (glassblowing) A blob of molten glass collected on the end of a blowpipe.
5. A gathering.
   • 2007, John Barnes, The Sky So Big and Black (Tor Books, ?ISBN):

     "I'll tell you all about it at the Gather, win or lose."

   • 2014, Paul Lederer, Dark Angel Riding (Open Road Media, ?ISBN):

     What bothered him more, he thought as he started Washoe southward, was Spikes's animosity, the bearded man's sudden violent reaction to his arrival at the gather.

Derived terms

• gathering iron

Translations

Anagrams

• Gareth, rageth