spool
- any cylindrical piece or device on which something is wound.
- a small cylindrical piece of wood or other material on which yarn is wound in spinning, for use in weaving; a bobbin.
- a small cylinder of wood or other material on which thread, wire, or tape is wound, typically expanded or with a rim at each end and having a hole lengthwise through the center.
- the material or quantity of material wound on such a device.
- Angling. the cylindrical drum in a reel that bears the line.
- to wind on a spool.
- to unwind from a spool (usually followed by off or out).
- Computers. to operate (an input/output device) by using buffers in main and secondary storage.
- to wind.
- to unwind.
Origin of spool
Examples from the Web for spool
Contemporary Examples of spool
There he lies in fetal position, reeling from thoughts of the atrocities he has committed, which spool endlessly in his mind.
Historical Examples of spool
A searchlight was on a tripod at the center, and a spool of electric cable.
Two Thousand Miles BelowCharles Willard Diffin
Guide it to its place with the thumb, and run it from side to side of the reel like cotton on a spool.
Black BassCharles Barker Bradford
Oh, look at the kitten chasing the spool, all in electric lights!
Blue-grass and BroadwayMaria Thompson Daviess
Pass the string through the handle of the pail and up over the spool (Fig. 33).
Common ScienceCarleton W. Washburne
Put a spool over the nail which was your fulcrum in the first two experiments.
Common ScienceCarleton W. Washburne
spool
- a device around which magnetic tape, film, cotton, etc, can be automatically wound, with plates at top and bottom to prevent it from slipping off
- anything round which other materials, esp thread, are wound
- (sometimes foll by up) to wind or be wound onto a spool or reel
Word Origin for spool
Word Origin and History for spool
early 14c., from Old North French spole, espole "a spool" (13c.), from Middle Dutch spoele "a spool," from Proto-Germanic *spolon (cf. Norwegian and Swedish spole, Old High German spuola, German Spule), from PIE root *spel- "to cleave, split" (see spoil).
c.1600, from spool (n.). Related: Spooled; spooling.
spool
- To store data that is sent to a device, such as a printer, in a buffer that the device reads. This procedure allows the program that sent the data to the device to resume its normal operation without waiting for the device to process the data.