What is "dogfight"

"aerial combat," World War I air forces slang, from earlier meaning "riotous brawl" (1880s); from dog (n.) + fight (n.). The literal sense of "a fight among or between dogs" is from 1650s.

n. 1 A twisting turning battle between two or more military aircraft, especially between fighters. 2 A fight between dogs. vb. To engage in a battle between fighter planes.

1. n. a fiercly disputed contest; "their rancor dated from a political dogfight between them"; "a real dogfight for third place"; "a prolonged dogfight over their rival bids for the contract"

2. an aerial engagement between fighter planes

3. a violent fight between dogs (sometimes organized illegally for entertainment and gambling)

4. v. arrange for an illegal dogfight

5. engage in an aerial battle with another fighter plane

A dogfight, or dog fight, is an aerial battle between fighter aircraft, conducted at close range. Dogfighting first appeared during World War I, shortly after the invention of the airplane. Until at least 1992, it was a component in every major war, despite beliefs after World War II that increasingly greater speeds and longer range weapons would make dogfighting obsolete. Modern terminology for air-to-air combat is air combat maneuvering (ACM), which refers to tactical situations requiring the use of individual basic fighter maneuvers (BFM) to attack or evade one or more opponents. This differs from aerial warfare, which deals with the strategy involved in planning and executing various missions.

Dogfight is a 1991 film set in San Francisco, California, during the Vietnam War (1963 – 1966). It stars River Phoenix and Lili Taylor, and was directed by Nancy Savoca.

The film explores the love between an 18-year-old Marine, Corporal Eddie Birdlace, on his way to Vietnam, and a young woman, Rose Fenny. Both lovers are portrayed as innocent and inexperienced: Birdlace is angry and inept, Fenny is idealistic yet unsophisticated.

A dogfight is an aerial battle between fighter aircraft.

Dogfight may also refer to:

Dogfight is a video game of the combat flight simulation genre released in 1993 by MicroProse. As the subtitle 80 years of Aerial Warfare suggests, the game featured simulation of aerial combat starting from World War I biplanes, right through to modern fighter jets.

In the USA, the game was released with the title Air Duel: 80 Years of Dogfighting.

Dogfight is an aerial combat video game released for the Apple II computer in 1980. A later version, Dogfight II, is copyrighted 1983. It is essentially a shoot 'em up style game, with the player controlling an aircraft which they can steer in one axis (left or right) and shoot. Similar to Asteroids, the screen wraps around at the edges, such that a player heading off the right edge of the screen will re-enter from the left.

Players can play solo against the computer, or, in a system very unusual in video games, up to 8 humans can play against each other. Since all control is via the single built-in keyboard of the Apple II, this involves the players crowding up against each other to reach their 3 keys. Each plane is identified by a number drawn next to it.

When a plane is shot, it becomes a parachuting figure, which transits the screen from top to bottom a few times and also may be shot.

The game was written by Bill Basham in Rockford, Illinois. He obtained an Apple II and began to program in machine language, and wanted to explore the animation capabilities. He ended up being able to smoothly animate up to 56 items on the screen at the same time. Part of the performance was obtained by using a lookup table.

Although voted into the Top 20 games in Softalk Magazine's April 1981 poll, the game was only moderately successful financially. A later version was given away with a later Basham program, Diversi-DOS, which was an enhancement utility for Apple DOS 3.3

"Dogfight" is a short story written by Michael Swanwick and William Gibson, and first published in Omni in July 1985.

Dogfight is a musical with music and lyrics by Benj Pasek & Justin Paul and a book by Peter Duchan. It is an adaptation of Nancy Savoca's 1991 film, Dogfight. The musical premiered Off-Broadway at the Second Stage Theatre in 2012, and in August 2014, the musical had its European premiere at the Southwark Playhouse in London.