return

Definitions

General English

  • noun the key on a keyboard which you press when you have finished keying something, or when you want to start a new line

General Science

  • noun an instruction that causes program execution to go back to the main program from a subroutine
  • verb to come back or to go back to an earlier position or place, or cause something to do so

Accounting

  • noun a profit or income from money invested
  • noun an official statement or form that has to be sent in to the authorities

Computing

  • noun a key on a keyboard used to indicate that all the required data has been entered
  • noun the indication of an end of line (in printing)

Construction

  • The continuation, in a different direction, of a molding or projection, usually at right angles.

Cricket

  • noun a throw by a fielder, sending the ball into the wicket
    Citation ‘Simpson-Hayward … had been unable to play at Pindi owing to a bruised hand — an injury received in the last over of the match from a very hard return’ (Headlam 1903)
  • noun the bowling analysis achieved by a bowler in a match or spell
    Citation ‘They made a good start but declined from 4–139 to be all out for 196, with Raelee Thompson having the excellent return of 5–33 off 28 overs’ (Cashman & Weaver 1991)
  • verb to throw the ball in to the batsman’s or bowler’s wicket after fielding it
    Citation ‘It is necessary to be able to gather in the hands a ball hit along or on to the ground and to return it equally surely and swiftly to either wicket’ (Ranjitsinhji 1897)
  • verb to achieve the stated bowling analysis in a match or spell of bowling
    Citation ‘He returned, too, the best first-class figures of any of the famous quartet, 9 for 72 for Mysore v Kerala in 1969–70’ (Frith 1984)
    Citation ‘After being asked to bat first, India were restricted to 185 for six from their 50 overs, with Isa Guha, the Berkshire seamer, returning figures of four for 29’ (Christopher Lyles, Observer 20 August 2006)

Economics

  • The amount that is earned by someone who holds an asset, usually expressed as a percentage of what it cost to acquire the asset. The return includes interest, dividends, and capital gains and losses, the latter due to both changes in the price of the asset and, for international holdings, changes in exchange rates.

Electronics

  • To go back, bring back, or send back, to an earlier state, place, setting, or the like. Also, the act of going, bringing, or sending back.
  • To reinstate control of a computer program to the point where an instruction, routine, function, or other operation was called. This is done once such an operation is completed. Also, the reinstating of control.
  • The action resulting from pressing a return key.
  • synonymradar echo
  • synonymretrace
  • The portion of a transmitted radar signal which a scanned object returns to the radar receiver. Also, the visual indication on a radar screen, such as a blip, of such a reflection. Also called radar return, return (3), return echo, or echo (2).
  • In a CRT, the return of the electron beam to its starting point after a sweep or trace. Also, the time interval that elapses during this return. Also called return trace, return (6), flyback, or kickback (2).

Information & Library Science

  • verb to give something back or to change it so that it is in its earlier state again

Politics

  • noun the election of an MP
  • verb to say or do something similar to something that has been said to you or done for you

Publishing

  • noun the act of giving something back

Real Estate

  • noun a profit made on an investment or business venture
  • verb to construct part of a building such as a wall or decoration so that it turns away from its original direction

Sports

  • noun an instance of hitting or playing the ball back to an opponent in a sport such as tennis
  • verb in sports such as tennis, to hit a ball, especially a service, back to an opponent

Travel

  • noun a journey back to the place you have left
  • verb to make an official statement to the tax authorities about income you have earned
  • abbreviationrtn

Origin & History of “return”

The origins of return are in vulgar Latin. there, Latin tornāre (source of English turn), which originally meant ‘turn on a lathe’, was combined with the prefix re- ‘back’ to produce *retornāre ‘turn back’, which passed via Old French retorner into English as return.
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