case

noun cases

1. An actual event, situation, or fact. For a change, in this case, he was telling the truth.
2. archaic A given condition or state. Thus vvhilſt he hopt he hild her leaſt, ſo altereth the cace / VVith ſuch as ſhe, Ah ſuch it is to build on ſuch a face.
3. A specific matter or piece of work, specifically defined within a profession, usually in respect of a specific person and/or event; the set of tasks involved in addressing one such matter. It was one of the detective's easiest cases.
4. An instance or event as a topic of study. The teaching consists of theory lessons and case studies.
5. A legal proceeding; a lawsuit or prosecution. “Two or three months more went by ; the public were eagerly awaiting the arrival of this semi-exotic claimant to an English peerage, and sensations, surpassing those of the Tichbourne case, were looked forward to with palpitating interest. […]”
6. A specific inflection of a word (particularly a noun, pronoun, or adjective) depending on its function in the sentence. The accusative case most commonly indicates a direct object.
7. uncountable Grammatical cases and their meanings taken either as a topic in general or within a specific language. Jane has been studying case in Caucasian languages.
8. An instance of a specific condition or set of symptoms. There were another five cases reported overnight.

   Opposite: noncase

9. A section of code representing one of the actions of a conditional switch. Place a break statement at the end of every case to prevent case fall-through.
10. archaic A love affair. Poor fellow, just as I thought! It's a case with him, anybody can see that. He is thinking about Christine, for a certainty. Lovers always take to stargazing and moonlight dreaming — it's part of their complaint.

Similar: befall, grammatical case · Opposite: noncase

verb cases · casing · cased

1. intransitive, obsolete To propose hypothetical cases. Casing upon the Matter.

noun cases

1. A box that contains or can contain a number of identical items of manufacture or commerce. When the ship reached Melbourne two days later we collared a couple of cases of apples from the hold and hid them in our bunks.
2. A box, sheath, or covering generally. a case for spectacles; the case of a watch
3. A piece of luggage that can be used to transport an apparatus such as a sewing machine.
4. An enclosing frame or casing. a door case; a window case
5. A suitcase.
6. A piece of furniture, constructed partially of transparent glass or plastic, within which items can be displayed.
7. The outer covering or framework of a piece of apparatus such as a computer.
8. historical A shallow tray divided into compartments or "boxes" for holding type, traditionally arranged in sets of two, the "upper case" (containing capitals, small capitals, accented) and "lower case" (small letters, figures, punctuation marks, quadrats, and spaces).
9. broadly The nature of a piece of alphabetic type, whether a "capital" (upper case) or "small" (lower case) letter.
10. slang Four of a kind.
11. US A unit of liquid measure used to measure sales in the beverage industry, equivalent to 192 fluid ounces.
12. A small fissure which admits water into the workings.
13. A thin layer of harder metal on the surface of an object whose deeper metal is allowed to remain soft.
14. A cardboard box that holds (usually 24) beer bottles or cans. a single case of Bud Light

    Similar: carton

15. UK, obsolete, slang A counterfeit crown (five-shilling coin). The price of a case (five shillings piece bad) from the smasher is about one shilling; an alderman (two and sixpence) about sixpence; a peg (shilling) about threepence; a downer or sprat (sixpence) about twopence.

adjective

1. not comparable, slang The last remaining card of a particular rank. He drew the case eight!

verb cases · casing · cased

1. transitive To place (an item or items of manufacture) into a box, as in preparation for shipment.
2. transitive To cover or protect with, or as if with, a case; to enclose. The man who, cased in steel, had passed whole days and nights in the saddle.
3. informal, transitive To survey (a building or other location) surreptitiously, as in preparation for a robbery. You are in the grounds of Brockholes Abbey, a house into which a great deal of valuable property has just been moved. And your job is to case the joint for a break in.

noun

1. abbreviation, acronym, uncountable Acronym of computer-aided software engineering
2. abbreviation, acronym Acronym of coatings, adhesives, sealants and elastomers.

noun

1. abstract feature of a noun phrase that determines its function in a sentence, such as a grammatical case and a position. The basic principle governing case is: (20) The Case filter: A lexicalized NP must bear a Case feature in S-structure. ‘Case’ with a capital C is here understood not as morphologically marked case, but as an abstract feature which will be present even in languages such as Swahili or Chinese which la

proper noun

1. A surname.
2. A township in Presque Isle County, Michigan, United States.
3. An unincorporated community in Laclede County, Missouri, United States.
4. An unincorporated community in Warren County, Missouri.