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Pumpkin - Dictionary Definition and Overview |
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Pumpkin : (noun)
1: a coarse vine widely cultivated for its non-keeping large
pulpy round orange fruit with firm orange skin and
numerous seeds; subspecies of Cucurbita pepo include the
summer squashes and a few autumn squashes [syn: pumpkin
vine, autumn pumpkin, Cucurbita pepo]
2: usually large pulpy deep-yellow round fruit of the squash
family maturing in late summer or early autumn
Based on WordNet 2.0
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Pumpkin : \Pump"kin\, n. [For older pompion, pompon, OF. pompon,
L. pepo, peponis, Gr. ?, properly, cooked by the sun, ripe,
mellow; -- so called because not eaten till ripe. Cf. Cook,
n.] (Bot.)
A well-known trailing plant ({Cucurbita pepo) and its fruit,
-- used for cooking and for feeding stock; a pompion.
Pumpkin seed.
(a) The flattish oval seed of the pumpkin.
(b) (Zo["o]l.) The common pondfish.
Based on Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary
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Pumpkin :
A humourous term for the token - the object
(notional or real) that gives its possessor (the "pumpking" or
the "pumpkineer") exclusive access to something, e.g. applying
patches to a master copy of source (for which the pumpkin
is called a "patch pumpkin").
Chip Salzenberg wrote:
David Croy once told me once that at a previous job, there was
one tape drive and multiple systems that used it for backups.
But instead of some high-tech exclusion software, they used a
low-tech method to prevent multiple simultaneous backups: a
stuffed pumpkin. No one was allowed to make backups unless
they had the "backup pumpkin".
(1999-02-23)
Based on Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary (1913)
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