Noun

(en noun)

Any condition, circumstance, opportunity or means, particularly favorable to success, or to any desired end.

* {{quote-magazine, date=2013-06-07, author= Ed Pilkington

, volume=188, issue=26, page=6, magazine=(The Guardian Weekly) , title= ‘Killer robots’ should be banned in advance, UN told , passage=In his submission to the UN, [Christof] Heyns points to the experience of drones. Unmanned aerial vehicles were intended initially only for surveillance, and their use for offensive purposes was prohibited, yet once strategists realised their perceived advantages as a means of carrying out targeted killings, all objections were swept out of the way.}}

* Shakespeare

Give me advantage of some brief discourse.

* Macaulay

the advantages of a close alliance

(obsolete) Superiority; mastery; — used with of to specify its nature or with over to specify the other party.

* Bible, 2 Corinthians ii. 11

Lest Satan should get an advantage of us.

Superiority of state, or that which gives it; benefit; gain; profit; as, the advantage of a good constitution.

(tennis) The score where one player wins a point after deuce but needs the next too to carry the game.

(soccer) The continuation of the game after a foul against the attacking team, because the attacking team are in a advantageous position.

* November 17 2012 , BBC Sport: Arsenal 5-2 Tottenham

Webb played an advantage that enabled Cazorla to supply a low cross from the left for Giroud to sweep home first time, despite Gallas and Vertonghen being in close attendance.

Interest of money; increase; overplus (as the thirteenth in the baker's dozen).

* Shakespeare

And with advantage means to pay thy love.

Noun

(en noun)

A hard external covering of an animal.

# The calcareous or chitinous external covering of mollusks, crustaceans, and some other invertebrates.

In some mollusks, as the cuttlefish, the shell is concealed by the animal's outer mantle and is considered internal.

Genuine mother of pearl buttons are made from sea shells .

# (by extension) Any mollusk having such a covering.

# (entomology) The exoskeleton or wing covers of certain insects.

# The conjoined scutes that comprise the "shell" (carapace) of a tortoise or turtle.

# The overlapping hard plates comprising the armor covering the armadillo's body.

The hard calcareous covering of a bird egg.

The hard external covering of various plant seed forms.

# The covering, or outside part, of a nut.

The black walnut and the hickory nut, both of the same ''Genus as the pecan, have much thicker and harder shells than the pecan.

# A pod containing the seeds of certain plants, such as the legume Phaseolus vulgaris .

# (in the plural) Husks of cacao seeds, a decoction of which is sometimes used as a substitute or adulterant for cocoa and its products such as chocolate.

The accreted mineral formed around a hollow geode.

The casing of a self-contained single-unit artillery projectile.

A hollow usually spherical or cylindrical projectile fired from a siege mortar or a smoothbore cannon. It contains an explosive substance designed to be ignited by a fuse or by percussion at the target site so that it will burst and scattered at high velocity its contents and fragments. Formerly called a bomb.

The cartridge of a breechloading firearm; a load; a bullet; a round.

Any slight hollow structure; a framework, or exterior structure, regarded as not complete or filled in, as the shell of a house.

A garment, usually worn by women, such as a shirt, blouse, or top, with short sleeves or no sleeves, that often fastens in the rear.

A coarse or flimsy coffin; a thin interior coffin enclosed within a more substantial one.

(Knight)

(music) A string instrument, as a lyre, whose acoustical chamber is formed like a shell.

The first lyre may have been made by drawing strings over the underside of a tortoise shell.

* Dryden

when Jubal struck the chorded shell

(music) The body of a drum; the often wooden, often cylindrical acoustic chamber, with or without rims added for tuning and for attaching the drum head.

An engraved copper roller used in print works.

(nautical) The watertight outer covering of the hull of a vessel, often made with planking or metal plating.

(nautical, rigging) The outer frame or case of a block within which the sheaves revolve.

(nautical) A light boat the frame of which is covered with thin wood, impermeable fabric, or water-proofed paper; a racing shell or dragon boat.

(computing) An operating system software user interface, whose primary purpose is to launch other programs and control their interactions; the user's command interpreter.

The name shell originates from it being viewed as an outer layer of interface between the user and the internals of the operating system.

The name "Bash" is an acronym which stands for "Bourne-again shell", itself a pun on the name of the "Bourne shell", an earlier Unix shell designed by Stephen Bourne, and the Christian concept of being "born again".

(chemistry) A set of atomic orbitals that have the same principal quantum number.

An emaciated person.

He's lost so much weight from illness; he's a shell of his former self.

A psychological barrier to social interaction.

Even after months of therapy he's still in his shell .

(business) A legal entity that has no operations.

A shell corporation was formed to acquire the old factory.