different between quantity vs shard

English

Etymology

From Middle English quantite, from Old French quantité, from Latin quantit?s (“quantity”), from quantus (“how much”).

Pronunciation

• (UK) IPA^(key): /?kw?n.t?.ti/
• (General American) enPR: kw?n?(t)?t?, IPA^(key): /?kw?n(t)?ti/, [?k?w?n(?)??i], [?k?w?n(t?)?t?i]
  • Note: This is with a relaxed middle T, and is only used in colloquial contexts by many speakers.
• (Canada) IPA^(key): /?kw?nd?di/, /?kw?n???i/
• (obsolete) IPA^(key): /?kwæn.t?.ti/

Noun

quantity (countable and uncountable, plural quantities)

1. A fundamental, generic term used when referring to the measurement (count, amount) of a scalar, vector, number of items or to some other way of denominating the value of a collection or group of items.

2. An indefinite amount of something.

   Some soap making oils are best as base oils, used in a larger quantity in the soap, while other oils are best added in a small quantity.

3. A specific measured amount.

4. A considerable measure or amount.

5. (metrology) Property of a phenomenon, body, or substance, where the property has a magnitude that can be expressed as number and a reference.
6. (mathematics) Indicates that the entire preceding expression is henceforth considered a single object.
   • 2006, Jerome E. Kaufmann and Karen Schwitters, Elementary and Intermediate Algebra: A Combined Approach, p 89

     For problems 58-67, translate each word phrase into an algebraic expression. […] 65. x plus 9, the quantity squared

   • 2005, R. Mark Sirkin, Statistics For The Social Sciences, p137

     The second, ${\displaystyle (\sum x)^{2}}$, read "summation of x, quantity squared," tells us to first add up all the xs to get ${\displaystyle \sum x}$ and then square ${\displaystyle \sum x}$ to get ${\displaystyle (\sum x)^{2}}$.

   • 1985, Serge Lang, Math!: Encounters with High School Students, p54

     ANN. ${\displaystyle ra}$ quantity cubed.

     SERGE LANG. That's right, ${\displaystyle (ra)^{3}}$.

Usage notes

• In mathematics, used to unambiguously orate mathematical equations; it is extremely rare in print, since there is no need for it there.

Synonyms

• Qty

Derived terms

• unknown quantity

Related terms

Translations

See also

• measure
• unit

Further reading

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

English

Pronunciation

• (General Australian) IPA^(key): /?a?d/
• (UK) IPA^(key): /???d/
• (General American) IPA^(key): /???d/
• Rhymes: -??(?)d

Etymology 1

From Middle English shard, scherd, scheard, schord, from Old English s?eard (“a broken piece; shard”), from Proto-Germanic *skard? (“notch; nick”), from *skardaz (“damaged; nicked; scarred”), from Proto-Indo-European *(s)ker- (“to cut”). Akin to Scots schaird (“shard”), French écharde (“splinter”), Dutch schaarde (“tear; notch; fragment”), German Scharte (“notch”), Old Norse skarð (“notch, hack”) ( > Danish skår).

The database sense is perhaps derived from the online gaming sense or from SHARD (System for Highly Available Replicated Data), name of a 1980s database product.

Alternative forms

• sherd

Noun

shard (plural shards)

1. A piece of broken glass or pottery, especially one found in an archaeological dig.

   Synonym: potsherd
2. (by extension) A piece of material, especially rock and similar materials, reminding of a broken piece of glass or pottery.

   Synonym: splinter

   • 2014, Paul Salopek, Blessed. Cursed. Claimed., National Geographic (December 2014)[2]

     Inside its exhibit hall, behind panes of glass, in a white-lit lab, a team of restorers works on an ancient Byzantine floor: 44 square yards of stone shards rescued from Lot’s Cave Monastery.

3. A tough scale, sheath, or shell; especially an elytron of a beetle.
4. (online gaming) An instance of an MMORPG that is one of several independent and structurally identical virtual worlds, none of which has so many players as to exhaust a system's resources.
   • 1997, Ultima Online. The term "shard" is related to the backstory of the game, in which the Gem of Immortality is shattered by the Stranger, the protagonist of Ultima I.

     "The planet was still bound to the jewel's magic, even as it lay shattered upon the floor of Mondain's castle. For,^[sic] within each shattered remnant of the jewel, dwelled a perfect likeness of Sosaria. Thus is the world in which you are born, live, and die. Brittania^[sic], that was once Sosaria, now exists as a thousand worlds, each with its own peoples, history and destiny. This Brittania^[sic] is but one of many in the multiverse that is... ...ULTIMA ONLINE." - Intro cinematic to the game, written by Michael Morlan [3]

5. (databases) A component of a sharded distributed database.

   Synonym: partition

6. (slang, in the singular or in the plural) A piece of crystal methamphetamine.

Derived terms

• potsherd

Translations

Verb

shard (third-person singular simple present shards, present participle sharding, simple past and past participle sharded)

1. (intransitive) To fall apart into shards, usually as the result of impact or explosion.
2. (transitive) To break (something) into shards.
3. (online gaming, transitive) To divide (an MMORPG) into several shards, or to establish a shard of one.

Translations

References

• (pottery) Shard, in the Webster's New Collegiate Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, 1974 edition.

Etymology 2

Noun

shard (uncountable)

1. The plant chard.
   • 1684, John Dryden, “From Horace, Epode 2” in The Second Part of Miscellany Poems, London: Jacob Tonson, 4th edition, p. 79,^[4]

     Not Heathpout, or the rarer Bird,

     Which Phasis, or Ionia yields,

     More pleasing Morsels would afford

     Than the fat Olives of my Fields;

     Than Shards or Mallows for the Pot,

     That keep the loosen’d Body sound,

     Or than the Lamb that falls by Lot,

     To the just Guardian of my Ground.

Anagrams

• Dhars, Hards, hards

Middle English

Noun

shard

1. Alternative form of scherd