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Barely vs Null - What's the difference?

barely | null |

As an adverb barely

is (degree) by a small margin.

As a noun null is

zero, nil; the cardinal number before einn.

barely

English

Adverb

(-)
  • (degree) By a small margin.
  • * 1748 , , Oxford University Press (1973), section 8:
  • It becomes, therefore, no inconsiderable part of science barely to know the different operations of mind,
  • * 1925 , Walter Anthony and Tom Reed (titles), Rupert Julian (director), The Phantom of the Opera , silent movie
  • It is barely possible you may hear of a ghost, a Phantom of the Opera!’
  • (degree) Almost not at all.
  • The plane is so far away now I can barely see it.
    Yes, it is barely visible.
  • * {{quote-news, year=2011
  • , date=October 23 , author=Phil McNulty , title=Man Utd 1 - 6 Man City , work=BBC Sport citation , page= , passage=In contrast to what was to come, City were barely allowed any time to settle on the ball in the opening exchanges, with Ashley Young prominent and drawing heavy fouls from Micah Richards and James Milner.}}
  • (archaic) merely.
  • * 1661 , , page 29,
  • Now that fire do's not alwayes barely separate the Elementary parts, but sometimes at least alter also the Ingredients of Bodies

    Usage notes

    It is grammatically a negative word. It therefore collocates with ever rather than never. * Compare You can find barely ever used items on eBay.'' with ''You can almost never find used items on eBay.

    Synonyms

    * (degree) hardly, scarcely * hardly, just, only just, scarcely

    null

    English

    Noun

    (en noun)
  • A non-existent or empty value or set of values.
  • Zero]] quantity of [[expression, expressions; nothing.
  • (Francis Bacon)
  • Something that has no force or meaning.
  • (computing) the ASCII or Unicode character (), represented by a zero value, that indicates no character and is sometimes used as a string terminator.
  • (computing) the attribute of an entity that has no valid value.
  • Since no date of birth was entered for the patient, his age is null .
  • One of the beads in nulled work.
  • (statistics) null hypothesis
  • Adjective

    (en adjective)
  • Having no validity, "null and void"
  • insignificant
  • * 1924 , Marcel Proust, Within a Budding Grove :
  • In proportion as we descend the social scale our snobbishness fastens on to mere nothings which are perhaps no more null than the distinctions observed by the aristocracy, but, being more obscure, more peculiar to the individual, take us more by surprise.
  • absent or non-existent
  • (mathematics) of the null set
  • (mathematics) of or comprising a value of precisely zero
  • (genetics, of a mutation) causing a complete loss of gene function, amorphic.
  • Derived terms

    * nullity

    Verb

    (en verb)
  • to nullify; to annul
  • (Milton)

    See also

    * nil ----