different between slice vs length

English

Etymology

From Middle English slice, esclice, from Old French esclice, esclis (“a piece split off”), deverbal of esclicer, esclicier (“to splinter, split up”), from Frankish *slitjan (“to split up”), from Proto-Germanic *slitjan?, from Proto-Germanic *sl?tan? (“to split, tear apart”), from Proto-Indo-European *sleyd- (“to rend, injure, crumble”). Akin to Old High German sliz, gisliz (“a tear, rip”), Old High German sl?zan (“to tear”), Old English sl?tan (“to split up”). More at slite, slit.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /sla?s/
• Rhymes: -a?s

Noun

slice (plural slices)

1. That which is thin and broad.
2. A thin, broad piece cut off.

   a slice of bacon; a slice of cheese; a slice of bread

3. (colloquial) An amount of anything.
4. A piece of pizza.
   • 2010, Andrea Renzoni, ?Eric Renzoni, Fuhgeddaboudit! (page 22)

     For breakfast, lunch, or dinner, the best Guido meal is a slice and a Coke.

5. (Britain) A snack consisting of pastry with savoury filling.

   I bought a ham and cheese slice at the service station.

6. A broad, thin piece of plaster.
7. A knife with a thin, broad blade for taking up or serving fish; also, a spatula for spreading anything, as paint or ink.
8. A salver, platter, or tray.
9. A plate of iron with a handle, forming a kind of chisel, or a spadelike implement, variously proportioned, and used for various purposes, as for stripping the planking from a vessel's side, for cutting blubber from a whale, or for stirring a fire of coals; a slice bar; a peel; a fire shovel.
10. One of the wedges by which the cradle and the ship are lifted clear of the building blocks to prepare for launching.
11. (printing) A removable sliding bottom to a galley.
12. (golf) A shot that (for the right-handed player) curves unintentionally to the right. See fade, hook, draw
13. (Australia, New Zealand, Britain) Any of a class of heavy cakes or desserts made in a tray and cut out into squarish slices.
14. (medicine) A section of image taken of an internal organ using MRI (magnetic resonance imaging), CT (computed tomography), or various forms of x-ray.
15. (falconry) A hawk's or falcon's dropping which squirts at an angle other than vertical. (See mute.)
16. (programming) A contiguous portion of an array.

Derived terms

Translations

Verb

slice (third-person singular simple present slices, present participle slicing, simple past and past participle sliced)

1. (transitive) To cut into slices.

2. (transitive) To cut with an edge utilizing a drawing motion.

3. (transitive) To clear (e.g. a fire, or the grate bars of a furnace) by means of a slice bar.
4. (transitive, badminton) To hit the shuttlecock with the racket at an angle, causing it to move sideways and downwards.
5. (transitive, golf) To hit a shot that slices (travels from left to right for a right-handed player).
6. (transitive, rowing) To angle the blade so that it goes too deeply into the water when starting to take a stroke.
7. (transitive, soccer) To kick the ball so that it goes in an unintended direction, at too great an angle or too high.
8. (transitive, tennis) To hit the ball with a stroke that causes a spin, resulting in the ball swerving or staying low after a bounce.

Derived terms

Translations

Adjective

slice (not comparable)

1. (mathematics) Having the properties of a slice knot.

Further reading

• slice on Wikimedia Commons.Wikimedia Commons

Anagrams

• -sicle, Celis, ILECs, Leics, Sicel, ceils, ciels, clies, sicle

French

Pronunciation

Verb

slice

1. first-person singular present indicative of slicer
2. third-person singular present indicative of slicer
3. first-person singular present subjunctive of slicer
4. third-person singular present subjunctive of slicer
5. second-person singular imperative of slicer

Old Irish

Etymology

From Proto-Celtic *sleggio, from *sleg, from Proto-Indo-European *slak- (“to hit, strike, throw”). See also Ancient Greek ?????? (lakíz?, “to tear apart”).

Noun

slice m (nominative plural slici)

1. shell

Inflection

Derived terms

• slicén

Descendants

• Irish: slige
• Manx: shlig
• Scottish Gaelic: slige

References

English

Etymology

From Middle English lengthe, from Old English lengþu (“longness; length”), from Proto-West Germanic *langiþu, from Proto-Germanic *langiþ?, equivalent to long +? -th. Cognate with Scots lenth, lainth (“length”), Saterland Frisian Loangte (“length”), West Frisian lingte, langte (“length”), Dutch lengte (“length”), German Low German Längde, Längd, Längte, Längt (“length”), Danish længde (“length”), Swedish längd (“length”), Icelandic lengd (“length”).

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation, General American) enPR: l?ng(k)th, l?n(t)th, IPA^(key): /l??(k)?/, /l?n(t)?/
• Rhymes: -??k?, -???, -?nt?, -?n?

Noun

length (countable and uncountable, plural lengths)

1. The distance measured along the longest dimension of an object.
2. Duration.
   • 1941, Robert Frost, The Gift Outright

     Happiness makes up in height for what it lacks in length.

3. (horse racing) The length of a horse, used to indicate the distance between horses at the end of a race.
4. (mathematics) Distance between the two ends of a line segment.
5. (cricket) The distance down the pitch that the ball bounces on its way to the batsman.
6. (figuratively) Total extent.

7. Part of something that is long; a physical piece of something.

8. (theater) A unit of script length, comprising 42 lines.
   • 1890, Henry Austin, Address of Henry Austin Before the Second Nationalist Club (page 38)

     […] open your book of the play, which you have previously carefully perused, and at the same time marked with the proper calls, as thus: a length (or 42 lines) before an entrance, with a pen make a figure on the margin, […]

   • 1960, J. L. Hodgkinson, ?Rex Pogson, The Early Manchester Theatre (page 45)

     The boy was engaged to write out parts at a penny a length (42 lines) for Chetwood, who then charged the manager, […]

Derived terms

Translations

Verb

length (third-person singular simple present lengths, present participle lengthing, simple past and past participle lengthed)

1. (obsolete) To lengthen.
   • 1599, William Shakespeare, The Passionate Pilgrim, XIV. 30:

     Pack night, peep day; good day, of night now borrow: / Short night, to-night, and length thyself to-morrow.

   • 1552, Richard Huloet, "Ladies of Destinie" in Abecedarium Anglico-Latinum

     Was never man such favour could off atall ladies fynde, To cause them lengthe or shorte the day which they to hym assynde.

   • a. 1608, Thomas Sackville, Allegorical Personages described in Hell

     [He] knows full well life doth but length his pain.