generator
(ˈdʒɛnəreɪtə(r))
[a. L. generātor, masc. agent-n. f. generāre: see generate v.]
1. One who generates or begets.
| 1646 Sir T. Browne Pseud. Ep. vi. x. 327 Imagination..sometimes assimilates the Idea of the generator into a realty in the thing ingendred. 1814 Cary Dante, Par. viii. 141 Nature, in generation, must the path Traced by the generator still pursue. 1841–4 Emerson Ess. Ser. i. x. (1876) 252 Whilst the eternal generation of circles proceeds, the eternal generator abides. |
2. Something which generates or produces; esp. an apparatus for the production of gases, steam, or electricity.
| 1794 G. Adams Nat. & Exp. Philos. I. xii. 493 The French writers term it hydrogene, that is, generator of water. 1825 Hamilton Handbk., Generator in Pneumatics, the high pressure boiler of Mr. Perkins's steam engine is thus named. 1854 Ronalds & Richardson Chem. Technol. (ed. 2) I. 160 Generators are constructed either to work with or without a blast of air. 1879 Tyndall Fragm. Sc. (ed. 6) II. xvi. 435 By it, in short, the electric generator is so far simplified, and reduced in cost, as to [etc.]. 1884 Health Exhib. Catal. 109/1 Hot Wind Generator, for ventilating houses and hospitals, and heating same. 1895 Educ. Rev. (U.S.) Nov. 352 Dynamo, absolutely meaningless as at present found, is popularly used in place of generator. |
3. a. Chem. ‘A term used to denote the elements or compounds from which a more complex substance is obtained’ (Cassell).
b. Mus. The ‘fundamental tone’ of a series of harmonics or of a chord.
| 1825 Danneley Encycl. Mus. s.v. Sound, The diatonic scale is therefore formed by the products of a sonorous body, generator or generating string. 1847 Craig, Generator, in Music, the principal sound or sounds by which others are produced. 1889 E. Prout Harmony ii. §33 The division of any string into halves, quarters, eighths, or sixteenths, gives the various upper octaves of the ‘generator’, or ‘fundamental tone’, that is the note produced by the vibration of the whole length of the string. |
4. a. Geom. = generant A. b.
| 1863 Phil. Trans. R. Soc. CLIII. 455 The nodal generating lines or Nodal Generator. 1893 N. F. Dupuis Elem. Synthetic Solid Geom. i. 7 The variable line N is called the generator, and the fixed guiding lines are directors. 1959 Chambers's Encycl. III. 837/1 Analytically, it is convenient to regard the generators of a cone (i.e. the lines joining the vertex to points on the base circle) as extending to infinity in both directions. |
b. Algebra. Any of a subset of the elements of a set in terms of which all the other elements of the set can be represented, using specified operations.
| 1894 Bull. Amer. Math. Soc. I. 63 A substitution σ of Γ7 is determined by the elements a{p}, b{p}, c{p} which it makes correspond to the generators a, b, c. 1940 C. C. MacDuffee Introd. Abstract Algebra ii. 53 A cyclic group has as its elements the powers of a single generator. 1947 Birkhoff & MacLane Surv. Mod. Algebra xiv. 373 Any number in the field can be expressed in terms of this new generator. |
c. Computers. A routine that enables a computer to construct from a set of parameters other routines or sub-routines with specific applications. Also attrib.
| 1953 Computers & Automation May 4 Editing is but one phase of the commercial and logistic problems which lend themselves to generator techniques. 1956 Berkeley & Wainwright Computers viii. 344/2 Generator, a computer program which generates coding. 1958 Gotlieb & Hume High-Speed Data Processing xiv. 293 Generators have also been written for editing, re-run procedures, tape checking, and moving records. 1962 Huskey & Korn Computer Handbk. xvii. 19 If memory space is not a problem the input information can be reduced to reasonable size by devising a generator code which is usually cyclic in character and can produce the linear code. |