English

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Alternative forms

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Etymology

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From em- +‎ bed.

Pronunciation

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  • verb:
    • IPA(key): /ɪmˈbɛd/, /ɛmˈbɛd/, (regionally) /əmˈbɛd/
    • Audio (US):(file)
    • Rhymes: -ɛd
  • noun:

Verb

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embed (third-person singular simple present embeds, present participle embedding, simple past and past participle embedded)

  1. (transitive) To lay (something) as in a bed; to lay in surrounding matter; to bed.
    to embed something in clay, mortar, or sand
    • 1851, Thomas Carlyle, “Coleridge”, in The Life of John Sterling, London: Chapman and Hall, [], →OCLC, part I, page 78:
      To the man himself [Samuel Taylor Coleridge] Nature had given, in high measure, the seeds of a noble endowment; [] but imbedded in such weak laxity of character, in such indolences and esuriences as had made strange work with it.
    • 1859, Charles Darwin, The Origin of Species:
      I have given my reasons for believing that … ; and that blank intervals of vast duration, as far as fossils are concerned, occurred during the periods when the bed of the sea was either stationary or rising, and likewise when sediment was not thrown down quickly enough to embed and preserve organic remains.
    • 1960 March, “The January blizzard in the North-East of Scotland”, in Trains Illustrated, page 139:
      In the opposite direction a train got away from Huntly, but became embedded in the snow at Insch, where the passengers spent the night.
  2. (transitive, by extension) To include (something) in surrounding matter.
    We wanted to embed our reporter with the Fifth Infantry Division, but the Army would have none of it.
    • 2017 July 7, Ignatiy Vishnevetsky, “The ambitious War For The Planet Of The Apes ends up surrendering to formula”, in The Onion AV Club[1]:
      After some unnecessary, producer-pleasing expository text, he opens the movie in close-up on the back of a camo combat helmet Sharpied in Vietnam-style graffiti, effectively embedding the viewer with a bedraggled squad of human soldiers—armed with assault rifles, sawed-off shotguns, and crossbows—as they inch toward the stake-wall of Caesar’s compound in an attempt to bust through, only to be met with deadly clumps of Amazonian arrows and smoky flung projectiles.
  3. (transitive, computing) To encapsulate within another document or data file.
    The instructions showed how to embed a chart from the spreadsheet within the wordprocessor document.
  4. (mathematics, transitive) To define a one-to-one function from one set to another so that certain properties of the domain are preserved when considering the image as a subset of the codomain.
    The torus   can be embedded in  .

Derived terms

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Translations

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The translations below need to be checked and inserted above into the appropriate translation tables. See instructions at Wiktionary:Entry layout § Translations.

Noun

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embed (plural embeds)

  1. One thing embedded within another, as:
    1. (journalism) An embedded reporter or journalist, such as a war reporter assigned to and travelling with a military unit, or a political reporter assigned to follow and report on the campaign of a candidate.
    2. An element of an advertisement, etc. serving as a subliminal message.
      • 1992, Sammy Richard Danna, Advertising and Popular Culture:
        He alleges that ads for Seagram's gin, Chivas Regal scotch, Bacardi rum, Sprite soda, Camel and Kent cigarettes, Tweed perfume, Kanon cologne and myriad other products include embeds surreptitiously placed to induce purchase.
    3. (computing) A digital object embedded within another, which is often a document.
      • 2006, Richard Rutter, Andy Budd, Simon Collison, Blog Design Solutions:
        When you change the content of these embeds, this information will be automatically updated in every page that the embeds are included in.
      • 2011, Steve Fulton, Jeff Fulton, HTML5 Canvas, page 265:
        Adding controls, looping, and autoplay to an HTML5 video embed is simple.
    4. (computing) A piece of computer hardware embedded within another physical object, which is often a larger IT device.

Further reading

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