profile

From French profil, from Italian profilo (“a border”), later also proffilo (“a side-face, profile”), from Latin pro (“before”) + filo (“a line, stroke, thread”), from filum (“a thread”); see file. Doublet of purfle.

• (UK) IPA^(key): /ˈpɹəʊfaɪl/

• Audio (Southern England)

  (file)

• (US) IPA^(key): /ˈpɹoʊfaɪl/
• Rhymes: (UK) -əʊfaɪl

profile (countable and uncountable, plural profiles)

1. (countable) The outermost shape, view, or edge of an object.

   Synonym: contour

   His fingers traced the profile of the handle.

2. (countable) The shape, view, or shadow of a person's head from the side; a side view.

   The brooch showed the profile of a Victorian woman.

   Driver's licenses have a photograph of the person on them, which is in full face if the person is above legal drinking age, or in profile if not.

3. (countable) A summary or collection of information, especially about a person

   Law enforcement assembled a profile of the suspect.

4. (Internet, countable) A specific page or field in which users can provide various types of personal information in software or Internet systems.

   I just updated my Facebook profile to show I got engaged.

5. (figurative, uncountable) Reputation, prominence; noticeability.

   Acting is, by nature, profession in which one must keep a high profile.

6. (uncountable) The amount by which something protrudes.

   Choose a handle with a low profile so it does not catch on things.

7. (archaeology) A smoothed (e.g., troweled or brushed) vertical surface of an excavation showing evidence of at least one feature or diagnostic specimen; the graphic recording of such as by sketching, photographing, etc.
8. Character; totality of related characteristics; signature; status (especially in scientific, technical, or military uses).

   What's the thermal profile on that thing?

9. (architecture) A section of any member, made at right angles with its main lines, showing the exact shape of mouldings etc.
10. (civil engineering) A drawing exhibiting a vertical section of the ground along a surveyed line, or graded work, as of a railway, showing elevations, depressions, grades, etc.
11. (military slang) An exemption from certain types of duties due to injury or disability.

profile (third-person singular simple present profiles, present participle profiling, simple past and past participle profiled)

1. (transitive) To create a summary or collection of information about (a person, etc.).
   • 1984 April 7, Warren Blumenfeld, “Boston's Other Voice”, in Gay Community News, page 11:

     The book The Men with the Pink Triangles, profiling the lives of gay prisoners in the German concentration camp.

   • 2018, Clarence Green, James Lambert, “Advancing disciplinary literacy through English for academic purposes: Discipline-specific wordlists, collocations and word families for eight secondary subjects”, in Journal of English for Academic Purposes, volume 35, →DOI, page 106:

     A resource that profiles the important language of secondary disciplines by adapting the methods of EAP research could therefore be very useful for such pedagogy.

2. To act based on such a summary, especially one that is a stereotype; to engage in profiling.
3. (transitive) To draw in profile or outline.
4. (transitive, engineering) To give a definite form by chiselling, milling, etc.
5. (computing, transitive) To measure the performance of various parts of (a program) so as to locate bottlenecks.
   • 2006, Dr. Dobb's Journal:

     […] a complete and intuitive profiler that supports numerous types of profiling modes and profilable applications.

• reprofile

• profile on Wikipedia.Wikipedia
• “profile”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.
• “profile”, in The Century Dictionary […], New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911, →OCLC.

• pro-life

• IPA^(key): /pʁɔ.fil/

• Audio

  (file)

profile

1. inflection of profiler:
   1. first/third-person singular present indicative/subjunctive
   2. second-person singular imperative