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tool
Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English
tool
I.noun
COLLOCATIONS FROM OTHER ENTRIES
a propaganda tool (=an organization or type of communication that is used to spread propaganda)
▪ The newspaper had been turned into a propaganda tool.
a useful tool
▪ The Internet is a useful tool for investors.
diagnostic tests/tools
▪ Doctors depend on accurate diagnostic tools.
garden tools (=tools that you use for digging, planting etc in the garden)
▪ Choose the right garden tool and you’ll do the job properly.
gardening gloves/tools/equipment etc
hand tool
machine tool
power tool
powerful tool (=very effective method)
▪ Good teamwork is a powerful tool for effective management.
tool kit
▪ I realized I’d left my tool kit at home.
tool shed
tool
▪ Exercise is a valuable tool in treating depression.
tooled up
PHRASES FROM OTHER ENTRIES
down tools
▪ After their workmate was sacked, the other machinists all downed tools until she was reinstated.
not the sharpest tool in the box/shed
precision tool/instrument
▪ A precision instrument whose chief virtues were useless to anyone in this age.
▪ Basingstoke is noted for precision instruments.
▪ Wildland fire is not a precision instrument.
EXAMPLES FROM OTHER ENTRIES
▪ a tool for cutting metal
▪ a carpenter's tools
▪ A good tool kit should contain pliers, screwdrivers, and wire-cutters.
▪ All my gardening tools had been stolen from the shed.
▪ Dance and aerobics classes are a useful tool for encouraging girls back to school P.E. lessons.
▪ He couldn't finish repairing the engine because he didn't have the right tools.
▪ He took a spanner from his tool box and tightened up the bolts on the gate.
▪ Interest rates are one of the Finance Minister's main tools of economic policy.
▪ Pictures of fleeing refugees were used as an effective propaganda tool against the Communists.
▪ The Internet has been an effective tool for advertising.
▪ The king was merely a tool of the military regime.
EXAMPLES FROM CORPUS
▪ At first, options were distrusted by many as risky, esoteric investment tools.
▪ Inspection sites are dirty and may be cluttered with tools, materials, or debris.
▪ The elements of a nutrition program plan provide the manager with the tools to anticipate results and conduct ongoing evaluation.
▪ These plans were an invaluable tool which increased the accuracy and the efficiency of the project.
▪ Using the computer environment as our tool we can process and reshape all kinds of information swiftly and perfectly.
II.verb
COLLOCATIONS FROM CORPUS
■ ADVERB
up
▪ Get tooled up with baseball bats and go smash some windows in some club.
PHRASES FROM OTHER ENTRIES
not the sharpest tool in the box/shed
precision tool/instrument
▪ A precision instrument whose chief virtues were useless to anyone in this age.
▪ Basingstoke is noted for precision instruments.
▪ Wildland fire is not a precision instrument.
The Collaborative International Dictionary
Tool

Tool \Tool\ (t[=oo]l), v. i. [Cf. Tool, v. t., 2.] To travel in a vehicle; to ride or drive. [Colloq.]

Boys on their bicycles tooling along the well-kept roads.
--Illust. American.

Tool

Tool \Tool\, v. t. [imp. & p. p. tooled; p. pr. & vb. n. tooling.]

  1. To shape, form, or finish with a tool. ``Elaborately tooled.''
    --Ld. Lytton.

  2. To drive, as a coach. [Slang, Eng.]

Tool

Tool \Tool\ (t[=oo]l), n. [OE. tol,tool. AS. t[=o]l; akin to Icel. t[=o]l, Goth. taijan to do, to make, taui deed, work, and perhaps to E. taw to dress leather. [root]64.]

  1. An instrument such as a hammer, saw, plane, file, and the like, used in the manual arts, to facilitate mechanical operations; any instrument used by a craftsman or laborer at his work; an implement; as, the tools of a joiner, smith, shoe-maker, etc.; also, a cutter, chisel, or other part of an instrument or machine that dresses work.

  2. A machine for cutting or shaping materials; -- also called machine tool.

  3. Hence, any instrument of use or service.

    That angry fool . . . Whipping her horse, did with his smarting tool Oft whip her dainty self.
    --Spenser.

  4. A weapon. [Obs.]

    Him that is aghast of every tool.
    --Chaucer.

  5. A person used as an instrument by another person; -- a word of reproach; as, men of intrigue have their tools, by whose agency they accomplish their purposes.

    I was not made for a minion or a tool.
    --Burks.

Douglas Harper's Etymology Dictionary
tool

Old English tol "instrument, implement used by a craftsman or laborer, weapon," from Proto-Germanic *to(w)lam "implement" (cognates: Old Norse tol), from a verb stem represented by Old English tawian "prepare" (see taw). The ending is the instrumental suffix -el (as in handle (n.)). Figurative sense of "person used by another for his own ends" is recorded from 1660s. Slang meaning "penis" first recorded 1550s.

tool

"to drive a vehicle," 1812, probably from tool (n.) as if "to manage skillfully." The meaning "to work or shape with a tool" is recorded from 1815; that of "equip (a factory) with machine tools" is from 1927. Related: Tooled; tooling.

Wiktionary
tool

n. 1 (senseid en mechanical device intended to make a task easier)A mechanical device intended to make a task easier. 2 equipment used in a profession, e.g., '''tools''' of the trade. vb. 1 (context transitive English) To work on or shape with tools, e.g., ''hand-tooled leather''. 2 (context transitive English) To equip with tools. 3 (context transitive English) To work very hard. 4 (context transitive slang English) To put down another person (possibly in a subtle, hidden way), and in that way to use him or her to meet a goal. 5 (context transitive volleyball English) To intentionally attack the ball so that it deflects off a blocker out of bounds. 6 (context transitive UK slang dated English) To drive (a coach, etc.) 7 (context intransitive slang dated English) To travel in a vehicle; to ride or drive.

WordNet
tool
  1. n. an implement used in the practice of a vocation

  2. the means whereby some act is accomplished; "my greed was the instrument of my destruction"; "science has given us new tools to fight disease" [syn: instrument]

  3. a person who is controlled by others and is used to perform unpleasant or dishonest tasks for someone else [syn: creature, puppet]

  4. obscene terms for penis [syn: cock, prick, dick, shaft, pecker, peter, putz]

tool
  1. v. drive; "The convertible tooled down the street"

  2. ride in a car with no particular goal and just for the pleasure of it; "We tooled down the street" [syn: joyride, tool around]

  3. furnish with tools

  4. work with a tool

Gazetteer
Tool, TX -- U.S. city in Texas
Population (2000): 2275
Housing Units (2000): 1416
Land area (2000): 3.607782 sq. miles (9.344112 sq. km)
Water area (2000): 0.015894 sq. miles (0.041166 sq. km)
Total area (2000): 3.623676 sq. miles (9.385278 sq. km)
FIPS code: 73352
Located within: Texas (TX), FIPS 48
Location: 32.280459 N, 96.172678 W
ZIP Codes (1990):
Note: some ZIP codes may be omitted esp. for suburbs.
Headwords:
Tool, TX
Tool
Wikipedia
Tool

A tool is any physical item that can be used to achieve a goal, especially if the item is not consumed in the process. Tool use by humans dates back millions of years, and other animals are also known to employ simple tools.

Tools that are used in particular fields or activities may have different designations such as "instrument", "utensil", "implement", "machine", "device," or "apparatus". The set of tools needed to achieve a goal is "equipment". The knowledge of constructing, obtaining and using tools is technology.

Tool (band)

Tool is an American rock band from Los Angeles, California. Formed in 1990, the group's line-up includes drummer Danny Carey, guitarist Adam Jones, and vocalist Maynard James Keenan. Since 1995, Justin Chancellor has been the band's bassist, replacing their original bassist Paul D'Amour. Tool has won three Grammy Awards, performed worldwide tours, and produced albums topping the charts in several countries.

The band emerged with a heavy metal sound on their first studio album, Undertow (1993), and later became a dominant act in the alternative metal movement, with the release of their second album, Ænima in 1996. Their efforts to unify musical experimentation, visual arts, and a message of personal evolution continued, with Lateralus (2001) and the most recent album, 10,000 Days (2006), gaining the band critical acclaim, and commercial success around the world.

Due to Tool's incorporation of visual arts and very long and complex releases, the band is generally described as a style-transcending act and part of progressive rock, psychedelic rock, and art rock. The relationship between the band and today's music industry is ambivalent, at times marked by censorship, and the band's insistence on privacy.

Tool (disambiguation)

A tool is a device that is necessary to, or aids in the performance of an operation.

Tool may also refer to:

  • Tool (band), an American rock band
  • "Tool" (song), a song by Baboon
  • Tool, Texas, a US city
  • TOOL Programming language, the proprietary programming language used by Forte 4GL
Tool (song)

"Tool" is a 7" single by Baboon that was released in 1993 on Silver Girl Records. Side A is 33 rpm while side B is 45rpm.

The song "Tool" also appears on the band's first album, Face Down in Turpentine, though the album version is a different recording. The recording of "Tool" from this single also appears on the Get It Through Your Thick Skull compilation.

This version of the first b-side ("Why'd You Say Die?") is also on Face Down in Turpentine and Baboon's 1996 The Numb E.P..

Usage examples of "tool".

Please be aware that these principles are an absolutely essential foundation for understanding the rest of this book, for using the tools of Kabbalah that it presents, and for achieving the connection with the Light that is our true purpose in life.

Annamaria Roccaro was the last to get into position, smiling in apology as she crowded next to Aiken Drum and felt the hard tools in his pockets pressing through the sleeves and skirts of her habit.

The blazes were flaring high, and the man was standing by the tool shed, aiming a rifle.

The man was too awkward aiming, but he went instantly graceful when Rambo shot him, smoothly clutching his right shoulder, spinning easily, toppling perfectly over the bicycle next to the tool shed, and then he was awkward again as the bicycle gave way under him and the two jumbled to the ground in a tinny jangle of chain and spokes.

More locks, more tools, rough chunks of metal and wood, and a number of devices whose uses Alec could not guess were mixed indiscriminately among masks, carvings, musical instruments of all descriptions, animal skulls, dried plants, fine pottery, glittering crystals-there was no rhyme or reason apparent in the arrangement.

Unwrapping it, Alec found a tool roll identical to the one Seregil always carried.

Slipping the tools back into his coat, Alec pulled himself up by the window frame and wriggled in feet first.

The sitting room fire had been banked, however, meaning the master of the house was not coming down again before morning- Alec took a lightstone on a handle from his tool roll and shielded it with one hand as he crept to the door leading to the shop.

Springs, alembics, coils of copper tubing, buckled sheets of metal, gear systems both rack-and-pinion and epicyclic, pendulums, levers, cams, cranks, differentials, bearings, pulleys, assorted tools, and stone jars containing alkahest and corrosive substances crowded every horizontal surface.

For Amit, the greatest tools of spy craft are imagination and creativity, and both marked his tenure.

Our third division, advanced paleoliths and neoliths, refers to anomalously old stone tools that resemble the very finely chipped or smoothly polished stone industries of the standard Late Paleolithic and Neolithic periods.

Researchers of the late twentieth century have also discovered anomalously old stone tool industries.

Several anomalously old crude stone tool industries of Eolithic type have been discovered in the Americas.

Lane, some five or six years after Will Locke and Dulcie were wed, with its strange litter of acids and aquafortis, graving tools and steel plates.

The Tools of Bael consist of the Anima di LuciferBlood of Luciferthat is the aquamanile, and the Voce di Luciferthe Voice of Luciferwhich is a gold chalice.