data meaning: definition, etymology and quotations

data

noun

UK /ˈdɑːtə/ · US, UK /ˈdeɪtə/

Etymology Borrowed from Latin data, nominative plural of datum (“that is given”), neuter past participle of dō (“to give”); by surface analysis, dat(um) + -a. Doublet of date.

Computing, Engineering, Mathematics, Natural sciences, Physical sciences, Sciences Collective A representation of information in a computer (as symbols, quantities, sound, images or videos) which is stored, processed or transmitted in the form of electrical signals, records on magnetic tape or punched cards, etc.

Data can be sent through email.

Collective Material recorded and known or assumed as facts and used as a basis for reasoning, discussion, or calculation, represented especially in the form of numbers, and usually structured (such as statistics).

Near-synonyms: dataset, data set, data points
This data shows that X is correlated with Y.

3 more examples

With fresh material, taxonomic conclusions are leavened by recognition that the material examined reflects the site it occupied; a herbarium packet gives one only a small fraction of the data desirable for sound conclusions. Herbarium material does not, indeed, allow one to extrapolate safely: what you see is what you get[…]1992, Rudolf M[athias] Schuster, The Hepaticae and Anthocerotae of North America: East of the Hundredth Meridian, volume V, Chicago, Ill.: Field Museum of Natural History, →ISBN, page vii:
Risk is everywhere.[…]For each one there is a frighteningly precise measurement of just how likely it is to jump from the shadows and get you. “The Norm Chronicles”[…]aims to help data-phobes find their way through this blizzard of risks.2013 June 22, “Snakes and ladders”, in The Economist, volume 407, number 8841, page 76:
When Hill wrote his history of “dude,” understanding such trends in slang was close to impossible. There simply weren’t enough data. Not so today. To uncover the hidden shape of vocative use, linguists can draw on one of the best datasets the English language has ever had: Twitter.2022 July 20, Nikhil Sonnad, Quartz:

Communications, Electrical engineering, Engineering, Mobile telephony, Natural sciences, Physical sciences, Telecommunications, Telephony Abbreviation, Ellipsis Ellipsis of mobile data (“digital information transmitted using the cellular telephone network rather than Wi-Fi”).

run out of data

Derived terms: 210 terms
abstract data type, air data, algebraic data type, anecdata, application protocol data unit, automatic data processing machine, biodata, bulk data, champion data, dark data, data access object, data acquisition, data analysis, databack, data bank, databank, data base, database, data-base, databend, data binding, data binning, data blocker, databook, data-bound, databox, data breach, data broker, data bus, data cable, Data Carrier Equipment, datacast, data center, data centre, datacentric, Data Circuit-Terminating Equipment, data collection, data collection tree, data communications, Data Communications Equipment, data compression, data controller, data coupling, data cube, data custody, data dictionary, data division, data domain, data dredging, data-driven, data dump, data DVD, data element, data engineer, data entry, data exhaust, data farming, data feed, datafication, data file, datafile, data flow, data flow diagram, dataframe, data fusion, datafy, data gathering, data glove, data governance, datagram, data hiding, datahub, data integration, data integrity, dataism, dataist, data journalism, data journalist, data lake, data lakehouse, data leak, dataless, datalike, datalink, datalog, datalogger, data logger, datalogy, data maintenance, data management, data manager, data mart, data matrix, data member, data mine, data miner, data-mining, data mining, data model, data modeling, datamosh, data munging, data object, data-oriented, datapad, data path, datapath, data-phobe, data-phobic, data phobic, dataphone, data plane, data-point, data point, data poisoning, data privacy, data-processing, data processing, data processing machine, data protection, data quality, data race, data rate, datarati, data record, data recorder, data recovery, data room, data rot, datascape, data science, data scientist, data scraping, data scrubbing, dataset, data set, datasheet, data sheet, data sink, data slam, data smoothing, data snooping, datasonde, data source, data sovereignty, dataspace, dataspeak, datasphere, data stick, data store, data stream, data structure, data-structured coupling, data swamp, data synchronization, data table, data terminal equipment, datathon, data trail, data transfer object, data transfer rate, data type, dataveillance, dataverse, data visualisation, data visualization, data warehouse, data warehousing, data wipe, data wrangling, eigendata, electronic data interchange, empirical data, event data recorder, flight data recorder, floating car data, floating cellular data, fundamental data, geodata, hyperdata, master data, master data management, megadata, mega-data, meta data, metadata, microdata, multidata, nuclear data, octal data rate, orthodata, paleodata, paradata, personal data, plain old data, pseudodata, Pure Data, raw data, reference data, session data, single data rate, statistical data binning, streaming data, the plural of anecdote is not data, tramp data, transaction data, USB data blocker, viewdata, virtual data room, voyage data recorder
Hyponyms: big data, metadata, primary data, raw data