Adjacent Words

Shifting definitions

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Webster's 1828 Dictionary

SHIFT'ING, ppr. Changing place or position; reporting from one expedient to another.

WordNet (r) 3.0 (2005)

adj
1: continuously varying; "taffeta with shifting colors"
2: changing position or direction; "he drifted into the shifting crowd"; "their nervous shifting glances"; "shifty winds" [syn: shifting, shifty]
3: (of soil) unstable; "shifting sands"; "unfirm earth" [syn: shifting, unfirm] n
1: the act of moving from one place to another; "his constant shifting disrupted the class" [syn: shift, shifting]

Webster's 1913 Dictionary

Shift Shift, v. t. [imp. & p. p. Shifted; p. pr. & vb. n. Shifting.] [OE. shiften, schiften, to divide, change, remove. AS. sciftan to divide; akin to LG. & D. schiften to divide, distinguish, part Icel. skipta to divide, to part, to shift, to change, Dan skifte, Sw. skifta, and probably to Icel. sk[=i]fa to cut into slices, as n., a slice, and to E. shive, sheave, n., shiver, n.] 1. To divide; to distribute; to apportion. [Obs.] To which God of his bounty would shift Crowns two of flowers well smelling. --Chaucer. 2. To change the place of; to move or remove from one place to another; as, to shift a burden from one shoulder to another; to shift the blame. Hastily he schifte him[self]. --Piers Plowman. Pare saffron between the two St. Mary's days, Or set or go shift it that knowest the ways. --Tusser. 3. To change the position of; to alter the bearings of; to turn; as, to shift the helm or sails. Carrying the oar loose, [they] shift it hither and thither at pleasure. --Sir W. Raleigh. 4. To exchange for another of the same class; to remove and to put some similar thing in its place; to change; as, to shift the clothes; to shift the scenes. I would advise you to shift a shirt. --Shak. 5. To change the clothing of; -- used reflexively. [Obs.] As it were to ride day and night; and . . . not to have patience to shift me. --Shak. 6. To put off or out of the way by some expedient. ``I shifted him away.'' --Shak. To shift off, to delay; to defer; to put off; to lay aside. To shift the scene, to change the locality or the surroundings, as in a play or a story. Shift the scene for half an hour; Time and place are in thy power. --Swift.

Webster's 1913 Dictionary

Shifting Shift"ing, a. 1. Changing in place, position, or direction; varying; variable; fickle; as, shifting winds; shifting opinions or principles. 2. Adapted or used for shifting anything. Shifting backstays (Naut.), temporary stays that have to be let go whenever the vessel tacks or jibes. Shifting ballast, ballast which may be moved from one side of a vessel to another as safety requires. Shifting center. See Metacenter. Shifting locomotive. See Switching engine, under Switch.

Webster's 1913 Dictionary

Use Use, n. [OE. us use, usage, L. usus, from uti, p. p. usus, to use. See Use, v. t.] 1. The act of employing anything, or of applying it to one's service; the state of being so employed or applied; application; employment; conversion to some purpose; as, the use of a pen in writing; his machines are in general use. Books can never teach the use of books. --Bacon. This Davy serves you for good uses. --Shak. When he framed All things to man's delightful use. --Milton. 2. Occasion or need to employ; necessity; as, to have no further use for a book. --Shak. 3. Yielding of service; advantage derived; capability of being used; usefulness; utility. God made two great lights, great for their use To man. --Milton. 'T is use alone that sanctifies expense. --Pope. 4. Continued or repeated practice; customary employment; usage; custom; manner; habit. Let later age that noble use envy. --Spenser. How weary, stale, flat and unprofitable, Seem to me all the uses of this world! --Shak. 5. Common occurrence; ordinary experience. [R.] O C[ae]sar! these things are beyond all use. --Shak. 6. (Eccl.) The special form of ritual adopted for use in any diocese; as, the Sarum, or Canterbury, use; the Hereford use; the York use; the Roman use; etc. From henceforth all the whole realm shall have but one use. --Pref. to Book of Common Prayer. 7. The premium paid for the possession and employment of borrowed money; interest; usury. [Obs.] Thou art more obliged to pay duty and tribute, use and principal, to him. --Jer. Taylor. 8. [In this sense probably a corruption of OF. oes, fr. L. opus need, business, employment, work. Cf. Operate.] (Law) The benefit or profit of lands and tenements. Use imports a trust and confidence reposed in a man for the holding of lands. He to whose use or benefit the trust is intended shall enjoy the profits. An estate is granted and limited to A for the use of B. 9. (Forging) A stab of iron welded to the side of a forging, as a shaft, near the end, and afterward drawn down, by hammering, so as to lengthen the forging. Contingent, or Springing, use (Law), a use to come into operation on a future uncertain event. In use. (a) In employment; in customary practice observance. (b) In heat; -- said especially of mares. --J. H. Walsh. Of no use, useless; of no advantage. Of use, useful; of advantage; profitable. Out of use, not in employment. Resulting use (Law), a use, which, being limited by the deed, expires or can not vest, and results or returns to him who raised it, after such expiration. Secondary, or Shifting, use, a use which, though executed, may change from one to another by circumstances. --Blackstone. Statute of uses (Eng. Law), the stat. 27 Henry VIII., cap. 10, which transfers uses into possession, or which unites the use and possession. To make use of, To put to use, to employ; to derive service from; to use.

Collin's Cobuild Dictionary

Shifting is used to describe something which is made up of parts that are continuously moving and changing position in relation to other parts. The Croatian town of Ilok is a classic case of shifting populations. ADJ: ADJ n see also shift

1811 Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue

Shuffling. Tricking. Shifting cove; i.e. a person who lives by tricking.

Moby Thesaurus

aberrancy, aberrant, aberration, aberrative, adrift, afloat, alternating, alternation, amorphous, bend, bias, bickering, boggling, branching off, capricious, captiousness, caviling, changeable, changeful, chicane, chicanery, circuitous, circuitousness, circumforaneous, corner, crook, curve, dangerous, declination, departing, departure, desultory, detour, deviable, deviance, deviancy, deviant, deviating, deviation, deviative, deviatory, devious, deviousness, digression, digressive, discursion, discursive, divagation, divagatory, divarication, divergence, diversion, dizzy, dodging, dogleg, double, drift, drifting, eccentric, equivocation, errant, errantry, erratic, evasion, excursion, excursive, excursus, exorbitation, fast and loose, fencing, fickle, fitful, flickering, flighty, flitting, floating, fluctuating, fluctuation, footloose, footloose and fancy-free, freakish, fugitive, gadding, giddy, gypsy-like, gypsyish, hairpin, hairsplitting, hazardous, hedging, impetuous, impulsive, inconsistent, inconstant, indecisive, indirect, indirection, infirm, insecure, insubstantial, irregular, irresolute, irresponsible, labyrinthine, landloping, logic-chopping, mazy, meandering, mercurial, migrational, migratory, moody, nit-picking, nomad, nomadic, obliquity, oscillation, out-of-the-way, paltering, parrying, pendulation, pererration, perilous, pettifoggery, planetary, precarious, prevarication, provisional, pussyfooting, quibbling, rambling, ranging, restless, risky, roaming, roving, scatterbrained, seesawing, serpentine, shaky, shapeless, sheer, shift, shifting course, shifting path, shifty, shuffling, sidestepping, skew, slant, slippery, snaky, spasmodic, spineless, straggling, stray, straying, strolling, subterfuge, sweep, swerve, swerving, swinging, tack, teeter-tottering, teetering, temporary, tentative, tergiversation, ticklish, tottering, traipsing, transient, transitory, transmigratory, treacherous, trichoschistism, turn, turning, twist, twisting, unaccountable, uncertain, uncontrolled, undependable, undirected, undisciplined, unfaithworthy, unfixed, unpredictable, unreliable, unrestrained, unsettled, unsolid, unsound, unstable, unstable as water, unstaid, unsteadfast, unsteady, unsubstantial, unsure, untrustworthy, vacillating, vacillation, vagabond, vagrant, variable, variation, veer, veering, vicissitude, vicissitudinary, vicissitudinous, volatile, wandering, wanton, warp, wavering, wavery, wavy, wayward, whimsical, winding, wishy-washy, yaw, zigzag