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Strait vs Null - What's the difference?

strait | null |

As nouns the difference between strait and null

is that strait is (geography) a narrow channel of water connecting two larger bodies of water while null is zero, nil; the cardinal number before einn.

As an adjective strait

is (archaic) narrow; restricted as to space or room; close.

As a verb strait

is (obsolete) to put to difficulties.

As an adverb strait

is (obsolete) strictly; rigorously.

strait

English

Adjective

(er)
  • (archaic) Narrow; restricted as to space or room; close.
  • * Emerson
  • too strait and low our cottage doors
  • * 1866 , , Aholibah , lines 53-55
  • Sweet oil was poured out on thy head
    And ran down like cool rain between
    The strait close locks it melted in.
  • * 1900 , , To One in Bedlam , lines 3-5
  • Those scentless wisps of straw, that miserably line
    His strait , caged universe, whereat the dull world stares,
    Pedant and pitiful.
  • (archaic) Righteous, strict.
  • to follow the strait and narrow
  • * 1597 , , IV. iii. 79:
  • some certain edicts and some strait decrees
  • * Bible, Acts xxvi. 5 (Rev. Ver.)
  • the straitest sect of our religion
  • (obsolete) Tight; close; tight-fitting.
  • * 1613 , , III. vi. 86:
  • Is not this piece too strait ? / No, no, 'tis well.
  • (obsolete) Close; intimate; near; familiar.
  • * Sir Philip Sidney
  • a strait degree of favour
  • (obsolete) Difficult; distressful; straited.
  • * Secker
  • to make your strait' circumstances yet ' straiter
  • (obsolete) Parsimonious; niggardly; mean.
  • * 1596 , , V. vii. 42:
  • I beg cold comfort, and you are so strait , / And so ingrateful, you deny me that.

    Usage notes

    The adjective is often confused with straight.

    Derived terms

    * straitjacket * strait-laced

    Noun

    (en noun) (wikipedia strait)
  • (geography) A narrow channel of water connecting two larger bodies of water.
  • The Strait of Gibraltar
  • * De Foe
  • We steered directly through a large outlet which they call a strait , though it be fifteen miles broad.
  • A narrow pass or passage.
  • * Spenser
  • He brought him through a darksome narrow strait / To a broad gate all built of beaten gold.
  • * 1602 , , III. iii. 154:
  • For honour travels in a strait so narrow / Where one but goes abreast.
  • A neck of land; an isthmus.
  • * Tennyson
  • a dark strait of barren land
  • A difficult position (often used in plural).
  • to be in dire straits
  • * South
  • Let no man, who owns a Providence, grow desperate under any calamity or strait whatsoever.
  • * Broome
  • Ulysses made use of the pretense of natural infirmity to conceal the straits he was in at that time in his thoughts.

    Derived terms

    * dire straits

    Verb

    (en verb)
  • (obsolete) To put to difficulties.
  • (Shakespeare)

    Adverb

    (en adverb)
  • (obsolete) Strictly; rigorously.
  • * 1593 , , III. ii. 20:
  • Proceed no straiter 'gainst our uncle Gloucester

    Anagrams

    *

    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 ----