different between instant vs instance

English

Alternative forms

• instaunt (obsolete)

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /??nst?nt/

Etymology 1

From Middle English instant (“infinitely short period of time”), from Old French instant (“assiduous, at hand”, adj), from Latin instans, instant- (“present, pressing, urgent”, literally “standing near”), from in + st?re (“to stand”). Compare Old English instede (“immediately, on the spot, at once”). More at in, stand.

Noun

instant (plural instants)

1. A very short period of time; a moment.

2. A single, usually precise, point in time.

3. A beverage or food which has been pre-processed to reduce preparation time, especially instant coffee.
5. Ellipsis of instant camera.

Translations

Etymology 2

From Old French and French instant, from Latin instans (“standing by, being near, present, also urgent, importunate”), present participle of inst? (“to stand upon, press upon, urge, pursue, insist”), from in (“on, upon”) + st? (“to stand”); see state.

Adjective

instant (not comparable)

1. (dated) Impending; imminent.

   Synonyms: pending, proximate; see also Thesaurus:impending

   • 1703, Matthew Prior, an Ode to Colonel George Villiers

     Impending death is thine, and instant doom.

2. (dated) Urgent; pressing; acute.
3. (dated) Insistent; persistent.

   Synonyms: exigent, imperious; see also Thesaurus:urgent

   • Rejoicing in hope; patient in tribulation; continuing instant in prayer.

   • January 2, 1827, Thomas Carlyle, letter to Mrs. Carlyle, Scotsbrig

     I am beginning to be very instant for some sort of occupation.

4. (law) Present; current; extant.
   • December 28, 2019 Attorney Jeffery S. Levin, quoted in The Boston Globe, p. 3

     He received just two disciplinary reports prior to committing the instant offense, one in March 2019 for activating an alarm during a non-emergency situation, and one in May 2019 for failing to provide a urine specimen.

5. Occurring immediately; immediate; present.

   Synonyms: instantaneous; see also Thesaurus:instantaneous

   • 1645, Thomas Fuller, Good Thoughts in Bad Times

     The instant time is always the fittest time.
6. Lasting for a short moment; momentary; short-lived.

   Synonyms: brief, transient; see also Thesaurus:ephemeral

7. Very quickly and easily prepared.

8. Of the current month.

   Synonym: (abbreviation) inst.

Derived terms

• instantize, instantise
• instantly
• instant mash
• instant replay

Related terms

• instakill
• instance

Translations

Adverb

instant (not comparable)

1. (poetic) At once; immediately.
   • 1819, Lord Byron, Don Juan, I.182:

     He left the room for his relinquished sword, / And Julia instant to the closet flew.

Related terms

• inst
• instance
• instancy
• instantaneous
• instantaneously
• instanter
• instantial
• instantiate
• instantly

Catalan

Etymology

From Latin ?nst?ns.

Pronunciation

• (Balearic, Valencian) IPA^(key): /ins?tant/
• (Central) IPA^(key): /ins?tan/

Noun

instant m (plural instants)

1. instant (very short period of time)

Related terms

• instantani

Further reading

• “instant” in Diccionari de la llengua catalana, segona edició, Institut d’Estudis Catalans.
• “instant” in Gran Diccionari de la Llengua Catalana, Grup Enciclopèdia Catalana.
• “instant” in Diccionari normatiu valencià, Acadèmia Valenciana de la Llengua.
• “instant” in Diccionari català-valencià-balear, Antoni Maria Alcover and Francesc de Borja Moll, 1962.

French

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /??s.t??/

Adjective

instant (feminine singular instante, masculine plural instants, feminine plural instantes)

1. (literary) pressing, insistent

Noun

instant m (plural instants)

1. instant, minute, moment

Derived terms

Further reading

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

Latin

Verb

?nstant

1. third-person plural present active indicative of ?nst?

Romanian

Etymology

Borrowed from English instant.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): [in?stant]

Adjective

instant m or f or n (indeclinable)

1. instant (very quickly and easily prepared)

Declension

Adjective

instant m or n (feminine singular instant?, masculine plural instan?i, feminine and neuter plural instante)

1. (nonstandard) instant (occurring immediately; immediate; present)

Declension

Synonyms

• instantaneu

Adverb

instant

1. (nonstandard) instantly

Synonyms

• instantaneu

English

Alternative forms

• enstance, enstaunce, instaunce (all obsolete)

Etymology

From Middle French instance, from Latin instantia (“a being near, presence, also perseverance, earnestness, importunity, urgency”), from instans (“urgent”); see instant.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /??nst?ns/

Noun

instance (plural instances)

1. (obsolete) Urgency of manner or words; an urgent request; insistence. [14th-19th c.]
2. (obsolete) A token; a sign; a symptom or indication.

   It sends some precious instance of itself/ After the thing it loves. Hamlet IV. v. ca. 1602

3. (obsolete) That which is urgent; motive.
4. (obsolete) A piece of evidence; a proof or sign (of something). [16th-18th c.]
   • c. 1594, William Shakespeare, The Comedy of Errors:

     The reason that I gather he is mad, Besides this present instance of his rage, Is a mad tale he told to day at dinner […]

5. Occasion; order of occurrence.
   • 1713, Matthew Hale, The History of the Common Law of England

     These seem as if, in the time of Edward I., they were drawn up into the form of a law, in the first instance.

6. A case offered as an exemplification or a precedent; an illustrative example. [from 16th c.]
   • August 30, 1706, Francis Atterbury, a sermon preach'd in the Cathedral Church of St. Paul, at the funeral of Mr. Tho. Bennet

     most remarkable instances of suffering

   • :

     sometimes we love those that are absent, saith Philostratus, and gives instance in his friend Athenodorus, that loved a maid at Corinth whom he never saw […]

7. One of a series of recurring occasions, cases, essentially the same.
   • 2010, The Guardian, 11 Oct 2010:

     The organisations claim fraudsters are targeting properties belonging to both individuals and companies, in some instances using forged documents.

8. (computing) A specific occurrence of something that is created or instantiated, such as a database, or an object of a class in object-oriented programming. [from 20th c.]
   • 2000, Dov Bulka, David Mayhew, Efficient C++: Performance Programming Techniques (page 149)

     Some compilers will allow statics to be inlined, but then incorrectly create multiple instances of the inlined variable at run-time.

9. (massively multiplayer online games) A dungeon or other area that is duplicated for each player, or each party of players, that enters it, so that each player or party has a private copy of the area, isolated from other players.
   • 2006 September 1, "Dan" (username), "Re: DPS Classes: Why should I heal you?", in alt.games.warcraft, Usenet:

     As long as the most difficult instance you've tried is Gnomeregan, you're never going to be credible talking about 'difficult encounters'.

   • 2010, William Sims Bainbridge, Online Multiplayer Games, Morgan & Claypool, ?ISBN, page 26:

     For example, when a team of five players enters the Sunken Temple instance in World of Warcraft, they will battle many monsters, but they will not encounter other players even though several teams of players may be experiencing the Sunken Temple at the same time.

   • 2012, anonymous gamer quoted in Andrew Ee & Hichang Cho, "What Makes an MMORPG Leader? A Social Cognitive Theory-Based Approach to Understanding the Formation of Leadership Capabilities in Massively Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Games", Eludamos, volume 6, page 31:

     Beating a difficult instance becomes second nature after running through it…a few times, with good leaders knowing exactly what to do and how to co-ordinate member actions.

10. (massively multiplayer online games) An individual copy of such a dungeon or other area.
    • 2005 January 11, Patrick B., "Re: Instance dungeons", in alt.games.warcraft, Usenet:

      The instance is created for the group that enters it.

    • 2005 December 6, "Rene" (username), "Re: Does group leader affect drops?", in alt.games.warcraft, Usenet:

      As soon as the first player enters (spawns) a new instance, it appears that the loottable is somehow chosen.

    • 2010, Anthony Steed & Manuel Fradinho Oliveira, Networked Graphics: Building Networked Games and Virtual Environments, Elsevier, ?ISBN, page 398:

      A castle on the eastern edge of the island spawns a new instance whenever a party of players enters.

Derived terms

Related terms

Translations

See also

• (computing) closure, class, object

Verb

instance (third-person singular simple present instances, present participle instancing, simple past and past participle instanced)

1. (transitive) To mention as a case or example; to refer to; to cite
   • 1946, E. M. Butler, Rainer Maria Rilke, p. 404

     The poems which I have instanced are concrete and relatively glaring examples of the intangible difference which the change of language made in Rilke's visions .

2. (intransitive) To cite an example as proof; to exemplify.

References

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

Anagrams

• ancients, canniest, cantines, catenins, enactins, insectan, tenascin

French

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /??s.t??s/
• Rhymes: -??s

Etymology 1

From Latin instantia

Noun

instance f (plural instances)

1. (often in the plural) urgent demand, insistence, plea
2. authority, forum, agency, body
3. (law) legal proceedings, prosecution process
4. (object-oriented programming) instance

Derived terms

• en instance
• tribunal d'instance
• première instance

Etymology 2

A derivative of etymology 1, but reborrowed from English.

Noun

instance f (plural instances)

1. (computing) instance

Anagrams

• cantines

Further reading

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