Noun

(en noun)

An insect of the order Hemiptera (the "true bugs").

(colloquial) Any insect, arachnid, or other terrestrial arthropod that is a pest.

These flies are a bother. I’ll get some bug spray and kill them.

Various species of marine or freshwater crustaceans; e.g. a Morton Bay bug, mudbug.

A problem that needs fixing, especially in computing.

The software bug led the computer to calculate 2 plus 2 as 5.

* {{quote-book, year= 1878

, year_published= 1989 , quotee= (Thomas Edison) , author= Thomas P. Hughes , quoted_in= American Genesis: A History of the American Genius for Invention , url= , title=Edison to Puskas, 13 November 1878, Edison papers , type= cited by , chapter= , section= , isbn= 0-14-009741-4 , edition= , publisher= Penguin Books , location= Edison National Laboratory, U.S. National Park Service, West Orange, N.J. , editor= , volume= , page= 75 , passage= I have the right principle and am on the right track, but time, hard work and some good luck are necessary too. It has been just so in all of my inventions. The first step is an intuition, and comes with a burst, then difficulties arise -- this thing gives out and [it is] then that "Bugs " -- as such little faults and difficulties are called -- show themselves and months of intense watching, study and labor are requisite before commercial success or failure is certainly reached. }}

A contagious illness; a bacterium or virus causing it

He’s got the flu bug .

An enthusiasm for something; an obsession

I think he’s a gold bug , he has over 10,000 ounces in storage.

to catch the skiing bug

An electronic intercept device

We installed a bug in her telephone

A small and and usually invisible file (traditionally a single-pixel image) on a World Wide Web page, primarily used to track users.

He suspected the image was a web bug used for determining who was visiting the site.

(broadcasting) A small, usually transparent or translucent image placed in a corner of a television program to indicate what network or cable channel is televising it

Channel 4's bug distracted Jim from his favorite show

(aviation) A manually positioned marker in flight instruments

A semi-automated telegraph key

* 1938 , Paul Gallico, Farewell to Sport , page 257:

At this point your telegraph operator, sitting at your right, goes "Ticky-tick-tickety-de-tick-tick," with his bug , as he calls his transmitter, and looks at you expectantly.

* 1942 , Arthur Reinhold Nilson, Radio Code Manual , page 134:

As far as the dashes are concerned, the bug is the same in operation as any regular key would be if it were turned up on edge instead of sitting flat on the desk.

* 1986 , E. L. Doctorow, World's Fair , page 282:

I was a very good radio operator. I bought my own bug . That's what the telegraph key in its modern form was called. It was semiautomatic.

(obsolete) A bugbear; anything that terrifies.

* Shakespeare

Sir, spare your threats: / The bug which you would fright me with I seek.

HIV.

(poker) A limited form of wild card in some variants of poker.

Noun

(en noun)

A generally tubular invertebrate of the annelid phylum.

* {{quote-book, year=1963, author=(Margery Allingham), title=(The China Governess)

, chapter=7 citation , passage=‘Children crawled over each other like little grey worms in the gutters,’ he said. ‘The only red things about them were their buttocks and they were raw. Their faces looked as if snails had slimed on them and their mothers were like great sick beasts whose byres had never been cleared. […]’}}

A contemptible or devious being.

* Bible, Psalms xxii. 6

I am a worm , and no man.

(computing) A self-replicating program that propagates through a network.

(cricket) A graphical representation of the total runs scored in an innings.

Anything helical, especially the thread of a screw.

* Moxon

The threads of screws, when bigger than can be made in screw plates, are called worms .

# A spiral instrument or screw, often like a double corkscrew, used for drawing balls from firearms.

# (anatomy) A muscular band in the tongue of some animals, such as dogs; the lytta.

# The condensing tube of a still, often curved and wound to save space.

# A short revolving screw whose threads drive, or are driven by, a worm wheel or rack by gearing into its teeth.

(archaic) A dragon or mythological serpent.

(obsolete) Any creeping or crawling animal, such as a snake, snail, or caterpillar.

* Tyndale (Acts xxviii. 3, 4)

There came a viper out of the heat, and leapt on his hand. When the men of the country saw the worm hang on his hand, they said, This man must needs be a murderer.

* Shakespeare

'Tis slander, / Whose edge is sharper than the sword, whose tongue / Outvenoms all the worms of Nile.

* Longfellow

When Cerberus perceived us, the great worm , / His mouth he opened and displayed his tusks.

An internal tormentor; something that gnaws or afflicts one's mind with remorse.

— Richard III ,

(math) A strip of linked tiles sharing parallel edges in a tiling.