component
- a constituent part; element; ingredient.
- a part of a mechanical or electrical system: hi-fi components.
- Physics. the projection of a vector quantity, as force or velocity, along an axis.
- Physical Chemistry. one of the set of the minimum number of chemical constituents by which every phase of a given system can be described.
- Mathematics.
- a connected subset of a set, not contained in any other connected subset of the set.
- a coordinate of a vector.
- Linguistics.
- one of the major subdivisions of a generative grammar: base component; transformational component; semantic component; phonological component.Compare level(def 16).
- a feature determined by componential analysis.
- being or serving as an element (in something larger); composing; constituent: the component parts of a computer system.
Origin of component
Synonyms for component
See more synonyms for on Thesaurus.comRelated Words for component
peripheral, item, factor, piece, segment, unit, ingredient, integral, fundamental, basic, constituent, fixings, making, plug-in, elemental, inherent, intrinsicExamples from the Web for component
Contemporary Examples of component
The Volcker Rule, a component of the far-reaching Dodd-Frank law, required large banks to cut back on proprietary trading.
Heck, all sports are basically weird activities if you take the time to actually examine the component parts.
We fight the sex industry in general, not its component parts.
But among the most effective fighters are those affiliated with the Nusra Front, a component of al Qaeda.
This factor seems to jibe with our overall rankings more than any other component.
Hot U.S. Cities That Offer Both Jobs and Culture Are Mostly Southern and Modest SizedJoel Kotkin, Wendell Cox
July 30, 2013
Historical Examples of component
As his eyes glowed, it resolved itself into its component specks.
InvasionWilliam Fitzgerald Jenkins
At this suggestion the component parts of his nature began a discussion.
If You Touch Them They VanishGouverneur Morris
The hyphen is used between the component parts of some compound words.
"Stops"Paul Allardyce
The fleet was an anomaly, and each of its component parts was separately a freak.
The Pirates of ErsatzMurray Leinster
The force enters into the mores and becomes a component in them.
FolkwaysWilliam Graham Sumner
component
- a constituent part or aspect of something more complexa component of a car
- Also called: element any electrical device, such as a resistor, that has distinct electrical characteristics and that may be connected to other electrical devices to form a circuit
- maths
- one of a set of two or more vectors whose resultant is a given vector
- the projection of this given vector onto a specified line
- one of the minimum number of chemically distinct constituents necessary to describe fully the composition of each phase in a systemSee phase rule
- forming or functioning as a part or aspect; constituent
Word Origin for component
Word Origin and History for component
1640s, "constitutional element" (earlier "one of a group of persons," 1560s), from Latin componentem (nominative componens), present participle of componere "to put together" (see composite). As an adjective, from 1660s.