different between help vs service

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English

Pronunciation

• enPR: h?lp, IPA^(key): /h?lp/
• Rhymes: -?lp

Etymology 1

From Middle English help, from Old English help (“help, aid, assistance, relief”), from Proto-Germanic *help? (“help”), *hilpiz, *hulpiz, from Proto-Indo-European *?elb-, *?elp- (“to help”).

Cognate with Saterland Frisian Hälpe (“help”), West Frisian help (“help”), Dutch hulp (“help”), Low German Hülp (“help”), German Hilfe (“help, aid, assistance”), Danish hjælp (“help”), Swedish hjälp (“help”), Norwegian hjelp (“help”).

Noun

help (usually uncountable, plural helps)

1. (uncountable) Action given to provide assistance; aid.

2. (usually uncountable) Something or someone which provides assistance with a task.

3. Documentation provided with computer software, etc. and accessed using the computer.

4. (usually uncountable) One or more people employed to help in the maintenance of a house or the operation of a farm or enterprise.

5. (uncountable) Correction of deficits, as by psychological counseling or medication or social support or remedial training.

Usage notes

• The sense “people employed to help in the maintenance of a house” is usually an uncountable mass noun. A countable form - “a hired help”, “two hired helps” - is attested, but now less common. Helper could be used if no more specific noun is available.

Quotations

For quotations using this term, see Citations:help.

Synonyms

• (action given to provide assistance): aid, assistance

Derived terms

Translations

Etymology 2

From Middle English helpen, from Old English helpan (“to help, aid, assist, benefit, relieve, cure”), from Proto-West Germanic *helpan, Proto-Germanic *helpan? (“to help”), from Proto-Indo-European *?elb-, *?elp- (“to help”).

Cognate with West Frisian helpe (“to help”), Dutch helpen (“to help”), Low German helpen, hölpen (“to help”), German helfen (“to help”), Danish hjælpe (“to help”), Norwegian hjelpe (“to help”), Lithuanian šelpti (“to help, support”).

Verb

help (third-person singular simple present helps, present participle helping, simple past helped or (archaic) holp, past participle helped or (archaic) holpen)

1. (transitive) To provide assistance to (someone or something).

2. (transitive) To assist (a person) in getting something, especially food or drink at table; used with to.

3. (transitive) To contribute in some way to.

4. (intransitive) To provide assistance.

5. (transitive) To avoid; to prevent; to refrain from; to restrain (oneself). Usually used in nonassertive contexts with can.

Usage notes

• Use 4 is often used in the imperative mood as a call for assistance.
• In uses 1, 2, 3 and 4, this is a catenative verb that takes the to infinitive. It can also take the bare infinitive with no change in meaning.
• In use 5, can't help is a catenative verb that takes the gerund (-ing) or, with but, the bare infinitive.
• For more information, see Appendix:English catenative verbs

Synonyms

• (provide assistance to): aid, assist, come to the aid of, help out; See also Thesaurus:help
• (contribute in some way to): contribute to
• (provide assistance): assist; See also Thesaurus:assist

Derived terms

Translations

Interjection

help!

1. A cry of distress or an urgent request for assistance

   (Robin Hood (1973))

Translations

Anagrams

• Pehl

Afrikaans

Etymology

From Dutch helpen, from Middle Dutch helpen, from Old Dutch helpan, from Proto-West Germanic *helpan, from Proto-Germanic *helpan?.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /???lp/

Verb

help (present help, present participle helpende, past participle gehelp)

1. to help

Dutch

Pronunciation

• Rhymes: -?lp

Verb

help

1. first-person singular present indicative of helpen
2. imperative of helpen

Esperanto

Etymology

From the bare root of helpi, following the model of English help! considered as internationally understood.

Interjection

help

1. Help! (as a cry of distress)

Old English

Etymology

From Proto-Germanic *help?.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /xelp/, [he?p]

Noun

help f

1. help

Descendants

• Middle English: help
  • English: help
  • Scots: help

References

• Joseph Bosworth and T. Northcote Toller (1898) , “help”, in An Anglo-Saxon Dictionary, 2nd edition, Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Old Norse

Verb

help

1. first-person singular present indicative active of hjalpa

Welsh

Etymology

Borrowed from English help.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /h?lp/

Noun

help m (uncountable, not mutable)

1. help, aid

   Synonyms: cymorth, cynhorthwy

Derived terms

• help llaw (“a helping hand”)
• helpu (“to help”)

West Frisian

Etymology

From Old Frisian helpe, from Proto-Germanic *help?.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /h?lp/

Noun

help c (plural helpen, diminutive helpke)

1. help, assistance, aid

   Synonyms: assistinsje, bystân

Further reading

• “help (I)”, in Wurdboek fan de Fryske taal (in Dutch), 2011

English

Alternative forms

• seruice (obsolete)

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /?s??v?s/
• (General American) IPA^(key): /?s?v?s/

Etymology 1

From Middle English servise, from Old French servise (French service), from the verb servir, from Latin servitium (compare Portuguese serviço, Italian servizio, Norman sèrvice, Spanish servicio), from servus (“servant; serf; slave”). Displaced native Old English þe?nung.

Noun

service (countable and uncountable, plural services)

1. An act of being of assistance to someone.
2. (economics) The practice of providing such a service as economic activity.
3. A department in a company, an organization, a government department, etc.
4. (computing) A function that is provided by one program or machine for another.

5. The state of being subordinate to or employed by an individual or group

6. The military.

7. A set of dishes or utensils.
   • 1997, Eduardo Galeano, Open Veins of Latin America: Five Centuries of the Pillage of a Continent, Monthly Review Press, page 36:

     When their lavish fiestas ended they threw the silver service and even golden vessels from their balconies to be picked up by lucky passersby.

8. (sports) The act of initially starting, or serving, the ball in play in tennis, volleyball, and other games.

9. A religious rite or ritual.

10. (law) The serving, or delivery, of a summons or writ.
    • 1668 July 3, James Dalrymple, “Thomas Rue contra Andrew Hou?toun” in The Deci?ions of the Lords of Council & Se??ion I (Edinburgh, 1683), page 548:

      He Su?pends on the?e Rea?ons, that Thomas Rue had granted a general Di?charge to Adam Mu?het, who was his Conjunct, and correus debendi, after the alleadged Service, which Di?charged Mu?het, and con?equently Houstoun his Partner.

11. (Israel, West Bank, also in Jordan, Lebanon and Syria) A taxi shared among unrelated passengers, each of whom pays part of the fare; often, it has a fixed route between cities.
12. A musical composition for use in churches.
13. (obsolete) Profession of respect; acknowledgment of duty owed.
14. (nautical) The materials used for serving a rope, etc., such as spun yarn and small lines.
15. Access to resources such as hotel rooms and web-based videos without transfer of the resources' ownership.

Usage notes

In British English, the indefinite article "a" is often used with “good service”, as in "A good service is operating on all London Underground lines", whereas this is not used in American English.

Antonyms

• (action or work that is produced and consumed): good
• capital

Derived terms

Related terms

• service à la française
• service à la russe

Translations

Verb

service (third-person singular simple present services, present participle servicing, simple past and past participle serviced)

1. (transitive) To serve.

2. (transitive) To perform maintenance.

3. (public relations, transitive) To supply (media outlets) with press releases etc.
   • 1977, Patricia Marshall, Citizen Participation Certification for Community Development (page 107)

     One obvious way is press releases, which should be sent to your region's reporters, editors and columnists, the wire services, professional publications. […] Servicing the media should be an everyday thing.

   • 1971, College and University Journal (volumes 10-11, page 9)

     […] instead of expending so much of their PR effort on servicing the media.

4. (transitive, agriculture, euphemistic) To inseminate through sexual intercourse.
5. (transitive, vulgar) To perform a sexual act upon.

6. (transitive, military, euphemistic) To attack.

   to service a target; target servicing

Synonyms

• (to serve): attend, wait on; See also Thesaurus:serve
• (to perform a sexual act): be with, go to bed with, sleep with; see also Thesaurus:copulate with

Descendants

• ? Dutch: service
  • ? Indonesian: servis
• ? German: Service
• ? Hindi: ?????? (sarvis)
• ? Hungarian: szerviz
• ? Japanese: ???? (s?bisu)
• ? Korean: ??? (seobiseu)
• ? Russian: ?????? (servis)
• ? Ukrainian: ?????? (servis)

Translations

Etymology 2

(This etymology is missing or incomplete. Please add to it, or discuss it at the Etymology scriptorium.)

Noun

service (plural services)

2. Service tree.

Translations

Anagrams

• cerevis, scrieve

Dutch

Etymology

Borrowed from English service.

Pronunciation

• Hyphenation: ser?vice

Noun

service f or m (plural services)

1. service

French

Etymology

From Old French servise, borrowed from Latin servitium (compare Portuguese serviço, Italian servizio, Norman sèrvice, Spanish servicio), from servus.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /s??.vis/

Noun

service m (plural services)

1. service
2. (tennis) service
3. (Switzerland, in the plural) cutlery

Derived terms

Related terms

• servir
• servant
• serf

Interjection

service

1. (Switzerland) you're welcome

Further reading

• “service” in Trésor de la langue française informatisé (The Digitized Treasury of the French Language).

Anagrams

• écrives

Norman

Alternative forms

• sèrvice (Jersey)

Etymology

From Old French servise, (compare French service), borrowed from Latin servitium, from servus.

Noun

service m (plural services)

1. (Guernsey) service

Old French

Noun

service m (oblique plural services, nominative singular services, nominative plural service)

1. Alternative form of servise

Swedish

Pronunciation

Noun

service c

1. service, the level of comfort offered by assistants and servants (the opposite of self-service)
2. maintenance and repair

Declension

Related terms

See also

• servis
• tjänst