bug

bug

1. (international standards) ISO 639-2 & ISO 639-3 language code for Buginese.

• bugg (obsolete)

First attested in this form around 1620 (referring to a bedbug), from earlier bugge (“beetle”), a conflation of two words:

1. Middle English bugge (“scarecrow, hobgoblin”), perhaps from obsolete Welsh bwg ("ghost, hobgoblin"; compare Welsh bwgwl ("threat", older "fear")) or from Proto-Germanic *bugja- (“swollen up, thick”), from Proto-Indo-European *bʰew-, *bu- (“to swell”)[1] (compare Norwegian bugge (“big man”), dialectal Low German Bögge (“goblin”, “snot”)). Or, from a word related to buck and originally referring to a goat-shaped spectre.
2. Middle English budde (“beetle”), from Old English budda (see sċearnbudda (“dung beetle”)), from Proto-Germanic *buddô, *buzdô, from the same ultimate source as above (compare Low German Budde (“louse, grub”), Norwegian budda (“newborn domestic animal”)). More at bud.

The term is used to refer to technical errors and problems at least as early as the 19th century, predating the commonly known story of a moth being caught in a computer.

• enPR: bŭg, IPA^(key): /bʌɡ/

• Audio (US)

  (file)

• Rhymes: -ʌɡ
• Hyphenation: bug

bug (plural bugs)

1. (entomology) An insect of the order Hemiptera (the “true bugs”).
2. Any of various species of marine or freshwater crustaceans; e.g. a Moreton Bay bug, mudbug.
   • 2021 February, The Road Ahead, Brisbane, page 39, column 2:

     Bugs, oysters, prawns and crabs […] are plated up on the decks of four side-by-side trawlers bobbing on the calm waters of Trinity Inlet.

3. (informal) Any insect, arachnid, or other terrestrial arthropod that is a pest.

   These flies are a bother. I’ll get some bug spray and kill them.

4. (informal) Any minibeast.
5. (US) Any insect, arachnid, myriapod or entognath.
6. (UK, obsolete, specifically) A bedbug.
   • 1874, Henry Sampson, A history of advertising, page 278:

     Speaking of advertising changes of name, a title by which those lodging-house pests, bugs, are now often known, that of Norfolk Howards, is derived from an advertisement in which one Ephraim Bug avowed his intention of being for the future known as Norfolk Howard.

   • 1910, Aristotle, translated by D.W. Thompson, The Works of Aristotle: Historia animalium:

     Bugs are generated from the moisture of living animals, as it dries up outside their bodies. Lice are generated out of the flesh of animals.

7. (chiefly computing and engineering jargon) A problem that needs fixing.

   Synonyms: defect, glitch

   The software bug led the computer to calculate 2 plus 2 as 3.

   • 1878, Thomas P. Hughes, quoting Thomas Edison, Edison to Puskas, 13 November 1878, Edison papers, quoted in American Genesis: A History of the American Genius for Invention, Edison National Laboratory, U.S. National Park Service, West Orange, N.J.: Penguin Books, published 1989, →ISBN, page 75:

     I have the right principle and am on the right track, but time, hard work and some good luck are necessary too. It has been just so in all of my inventions. The first step is an intuition, and comes with a burst, then difficulties arise — this thing gives out and [it is] then that "Bugs" — as such little faults and difficulties are called — show themselves and months of intense watching, study and labor are requisite before commercial success or failure is certainly reached.

   • 1968 April, Popular Mechanics:

     A... leading aluminum producer claims it has worked all the bugs out of building and servicing aluminum radiators, says it hopes to have a large chunk of the radiator market by the early nineteen seventies.

8. A contagious illness, or a pathogen causing it.

   He's got the flu bug.

9. (informal) An enthusiasm for something; an obsession.

   I caught the skiing bug while staying in the Alps.

   • 1957, Jack Kerouac, chapter 1, in On the Road, Viking Press, →OCLC, part 1:

     As we rode in the bus in the weird phosphorescent void of the Lincoln Tunnel we leaned on each other with fingers waving and yelled and talked excitedly, and I was beginning to get the bug like Dean.

10. (informal) A keen enthusiast or hobbyist.
    • 1961, Fredric Brown, Nightmare in Yellow:

      His mother had been a bug on astrology, which was why the moment of his birth had been impressed on him so exactly.

    • 1961, Kiplinger's Personal Finance, volume 15, number 12, page 34:

      Incidentally, the camera manufacturers have had a new worry—that they might "kill off the hobby," as U.S. Camera magazine put it recently—by automating to the point that real camera bugs would feel no challenge.

11. A concealed electronic eavesdropping or intercept device.

    We installed a bug in her telephone.

12. A small and usually invisible file (traditionally a single-pixel image) on a World Wide Web page, primarily used to track users.

    He suspected the image was a Web bug used for determining who was visiting the site.

13. (Maine) A lobster.
14. (broadcasting) A small, usually transparent or translucent image placed in a corner of a television program to identify the broadcasting network or cable channel.

    Channel 4's bug distracted Jim from his favorite show.

15. (aviation) A manually positioned marker in flight instruments.
    • 2004, Flying Magazine, volume 131, number 10, page 10:

      You look up the proper speed for the phase of flight, set the reminder bug, and then literally forget the speed. You don't read the airspeed number, you fly to the bug.

16. A semi-automated telegraph key.
    • 1938, Paul Gallico, Farewell to Sport, page 257:

      At this point your telegraph operator, sitting at your right, goes "Ticky-tick-tickety-de-tick-tick," with his bug, as he calls his transmitter, and looks at you expectantly.

    • 1942, Arthur Reinhold Nilson, Radio Code Manual, page 134:

      As far as the dashes are concerned, the bug is the same in operation as any regular key would be if it were turned up on edge instead of sitting flat on the desk.

    • 1986, E. L. Doctorow, World's Fair, page 282:

      I was a very good radio operator. I bought my own bug. That's what the telegraph key in its modern form was called. It was semiautomatic.

17. (obsolete) Hobgoblin, scarecrow; anything that terrifies. [late 14th c.–early 17th. c]

    Synonyms: bog, bogey, bogle, boggle, boggard, bugbear

    • c. 1610–1611 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Winters Tale”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act III, scene ii]:

      Sir, spare your threats: / The bug which you would fright me with I seek.

18. (chiefly LGBT, "the bug") HIV.
    • 2019, Tora Holmberg, Annika Jonsson, Fredrik Palm, Death Matters: Cultural Sociology of Mortal Life, Springer, →ISBN, page 130:

      The arguably most debated bareback practice that came to attract attention early on (and still does) was that of "bug chasing," in which HIV-negative men (bug chasers) actively seek out sex with HIV-positive men (gift givers).

19. (poker) A limited form of wild card in some variants of poker.
20. (paleontology, slang) A trilobite.
    • 2007, Kirk Johnson, Cruisin' the Fossil Freeway, page 174:

      We asked Harris if he had any recommendations about seeing the famous trilobite digs. He said we should just drive out to his claim in the Wheeler Quadrangle, and it was just fine with him if we dug a few bugs.

21. (petroleum industry, slang, dated) Synonym of oil bug.
    • July 1933, Popular Science:

      Now, only three years later, most of the major oil companies maintain staffs of these men who examine cores, classify the various types of "bugs," or foraminifera, and make charts showing the depths at which each of the hundreds of types is found.

22. (slang, US, horse-racing) An asterisk denoting an apprentice jockey's weight allowance.
    • 1999, Anita Scialli, Inside Track 1999, page 62:

      The "bugs" are the asterisks next to the apprentice's name. One bug is a five-pound allowance, two bugs equal seven pounds, and three bugs equal ten pounds.

23. (slang, US, horse-racing, by extension) A young apprentice jockey.

    Synonym: bug boy

24. (printing) Synonym of union bug.
25. (gambling, slang) A small piece of metal used in a slot machine to block certain winning combinations.
    • 1961, John Scarne, Complete Guide to Gambling, page 394:

      Because many illegal slot-machine operators here and abroad do not like to give the slot-machine player even one chance to hit the jackpot or the big bonus, they make use of a "bug." This is a small, flat half-circle of iron about an inch long, which looks something like a bug.

26. (gambling, slang) A metal clip attached to the underside of a table, etc. to hold hidden cards, as a form of cheating.
    • 1897, Robert Frederick Foster, Foster's Complete Hoyle, page 195:

      Some clumsy or audacious sharpers will go so far as to hold out cards in their lap, or stick them in a "bug" under the table.

    • 2006, Jon Sharpe, The Trailsman #299: Dakota Danger:

      Fargo had been in a saloon in Kansas when a man was caught using a bug. Made of steel and shaped like a money clip with two sharp ends, the bug was jammed under a table and held cards the bug's owner palmed until they were needed.

• See also Thesaurus:defect

bug (third-person singular simple present bugs, present participle bugging, simple past and past participle bugged)

1. (informal, transitive) To annoy.

   Don’t bug me, I’m busy!

2. (informal, intransitive) To act suspiciously or irrationally, especially in a way that annoys others.

   I'm worried about Wallace. He's been buggin' all week.

3. (transitive) To install an electronic listening device or devices in.

   We need to know what’s going on. We’ll bug his house.

4. (intransitive, of eyes) To bulge or protrude.
   • 1979 April 28, Lois H. Johnson, “Ten Years of Boston DOB: A Personal Memoir”, in Gay Community News, page 8:

     I well remember the combination of excitement and apprehension with which I tentatively entered my first "rap." My eyes bugged open. There must have been 25 women in the room. I don't think I had ever seen so many lesbians all together in one place before.

• See also Thesaurus:annoy

• Hemiptera on Wikipedia.Wikipedia
• Hemiptera on Wikispecies.Wikispecies
• Category:Hemiptera on Wikimedia Commons.Wikimedia Commons
• Software bug on Wikipedia.Wikipedia

• GBU, gub

Borrowed from English bug.

• IPA^(key): (Central, Balearic, Valencian) [ˈbuk], [ˈbak]
• Homophone: buc

bug m (plural bugs)

1. (computing) bug

   Synonyms: error, defecte

From English bug.

bug

1. (Hong Kong Cantonese, computing) bug (Classifier: 個／个 c; 隻／只 c)
2. (Hong Kong Cantonese, by extension) plot hole (Classifier: 個／个 c)

bug

1. (Hong Kong Cantonese, of software) to have bugs; to fault

bug

1. (Hong Kong Cantonese, of software) buggy; bugged

From Old Norse búkr, from Proto-Germanic *būkaz, cognate wtih Norwegian, Swedish buk, German Bauch, Dutch buik.

• IPA^(key): /buːˀɣ/, [ˈb̥uˀ]

bug c (singular definite bugen, plural indefinite buge)

1. belly (the lower part the body of an animal or, by analogy, an aircraft)
2. abdomen, abdominal cavity (the lower inner part of a human body)

   Synonym: mave

3. (informal) belly, paunch (a large protruding belly)

   Synonyms: mave, vom

Borrowed from English bug.

• IPA^(key): /bʏɡ/, /bɑɡ/

• Audio

  (file)

• Hyphenation: bug

bug m (plural bugs)

1. (computing) A bug (a software problem).

• bogue (computing)

From English bug.

• IPA^(key): /bœɡ/, /bɔɡ/

• Audio

  (file)

bug m (plural bugs)

1. (computing) bug

• buguer

From French bougre (“chap, guy”).

• IPA^(key): /ˈbuɡ/

bug

1. boy (young male human)

• Alfred W. Tobler (1987) Dicionário Crioulo Karipúna/Português Português/Crioulo Karípúna (in Karipúna Creole French), Summer Institute of Linguistics, page 5

Unadapted borrowing from English bug.

• IPA^(key): /bak/
• Rhymes: -ak
• Syllabification: bug
• Homophones: bak, Bak

bug m inan or m animal

1. (slang, software) software bug (error, flaw, or fault in the design, development, or operation of computer software that causes it to produce an incorrect or unexpected result, or to behave in unintended ways)

   Synonym: błąd

• bug in Polish dictionaries at PWN

Unadapted borrowing from English bug.

bug m (plural bugs)

1. (computing) bug (error in a program’s functioning)

   Synonyms: defeito, falha, erro

2. (Brazil, slang) anything causing unusual behaviour

• bugado
• bugar

Borrowed from English bug.

• IPA^(key): /ˈbaɡ/ [ˈbaɣ̞], /ˈboɡ/ [ˈboɣ̞], /ˈbuɡ/ [ˈbuɣ̞]
• Rhymes: -aɡ, -oɡ, -uɡ
• Syllabification: bug

bug m (plural bugs)

1. (computing) bug

   Synonyms: fallo, defecto