different between unpack vs unload

English

Etymology

From un- +? pack.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /?n?pæk/
• Rhymes: -æk

Verb

unpack (third-person singular simple present unpacks, present participle unpacking, simple past and past participle unpacked)

2. (transitive) To remove from a package or container, particularly with respect to items that had previously been arranged closely and securely in a pack.

   They didn't have time to unpack their bags before going out to dinner.

3. (intransitive) To empty containers that had been packed.

   They didn't have time to unpack before going to dinner.

5. (transitive) To analyze a concept or a text.
6. (linguistics, of a segment such as a vowel) To undergo separation of its features into distinct segments.
   • 2000, in Language, volume 76, issues 1-2, page 337:

     The rounded vowels [y] and [œ/?] in Russian seem to unpack as glide-vowel sequences in words borrowed from French and German, [...]

   • 2008, Katrin Dohlus, The Role of Phonology and Phonetics in Loanword Adaptation, page 73

     Whereas the high vowels /?, y/ unpack, the mid vowels /œ, ø/ are adapted as single segments in these languages (see examples in (36) for Vietnamese (Barker 1969) and (37) for Fon (Gbeto 2000)). [...]

     French /y/ ? Vietnamese /wi/

     accu [a'ky] ? ac-quy [ak kwi]

   • 2011, John A. Goldsmith, Jason Riggle, Alan C. L. Yu (editors), The Handbook of Phonological Theory:

     The objective of these corpora was to check whether vowels other than nasal vowels systematically unpack in L1s that do not allow them.

7. (computing, transitive) To decompress.
   • 2005, Matthias Kalle Dalheimer, Matt Welsh, Running Linux

     Packages […] are often archived and compressed using the zip utility; you can unpack these with the unzip command […]

Antonyms

• pack

Translations

See also

• unpack on Wikipedia.Wikipedia

English

Etymology

From un- +? load.

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /?n?l??d/
• (General American) IPA^(key): /?n?lo?d/
• Rhymes: -??d

Verb

unload (third-person singular simple present unloads, present participle unloading, simple past and past participle unloaded)

1. (transitive) To remove the load or cargo from (a vehicle, etc.).

   to unload a ship; to unload a camel

2. (transitive) To remove (the load or cargo) from a vehicle, etc.

   to unload bales of hay from a truck

3. (intransitive) To deposit one's load or cargo.
4. (transitive, intransitive, figuratively) To give vent to or express; to unburden oneself of.
   • 1984, John Arlott, David Rayvern Allen, Arlott on cricket: his writings on the game

     […] who bowled with such fury that he needed beer to give him something to sweat out, and who unloaded his emotions in words as hard as his bowling.

5. (transitive, computing) To remove (something previously loaded) from memory.
   • 1993, Tony Martin, Lisa C Towell, The NewWave agent handbook

     When you unload a DLL, the memory and other system resources it is using will become available for use by other applications.

6. (transitive) To discharge, pour, or expel.
7. (transitive) To get rid of or dispose of.

   to unload unprofitable stocks

8. (transitive, aviation) To reduce the vertical load factor on an airplane's wing or other lifting surface, typically by pitching downwards toward the ground to decrease angle of attack and reduce the amount of lift generated.
9. (transitive) To deliver forcefully.
10. (transitive, slang) To ejaculate, particularly within an orifice. (Can we add an example for this sense?)
11. (transitive) To draw the charge from.

    to unload a gun

Derived terms

• unloader

Translations

References

• unload in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, G. & C. Merriam, 1913.