array

English

Etymology

From Middle English arrayen, from Anglo-Norman arraier (compare Old French arraier, areer (“to put in order”)), from Medieval Latin arrēdō (“to put in order, arrange, array”), from *rēdum (“preparation, order”), from Frankish *raid or *raidā (“preparation, order”) or Gothic 𐌲𐌰𐍂𐌰𐌹𐌸𐍃 (garaiþs, “ready, prepared”), from Proto-Germanic *raidaz, *raidiz (“ready”). Compare Old English rād (“condition, stipulation”), Old High German antreitī (“order, rank”). Doublet of ready.

Pronunciation

• (UK, US) IPA^(key): /əˈɹeɪ/

  • Audio (US):

    (file)

• (General Australian) IPA^(key): /əˈɹæɪ/
• Rhymes: -eɪ

Noun

array (countable and uncountable, plural arrays)

1. Clothing and ornamentation.
   • 2017, anonymous author, “Sovay”, in Roud # 7, Laws N21‎^[2]:

     Sovay, Sovay all on a day, She dressed herself in man's array, With a sword and a pistol all by her side, To meet her true love to meet her true love away did ride.

   • 1700, [John] Dryden, “Palamon and Arcite: Or, The Knight’s Tale. In Three Books.”, in Fables Ancient and Modern; […], London: […] Jacob Tonson, […], →OCLC, book I, page 8:

     In this Remembrance Emily e’re day / Aroſe, and dreſs’d her ſelf in rich Array […]

2. A collection laid out to be viewed in full.
   • 1788 June, Richard Brinsley Sheridan, “Mr. Sheridan’s Speech, on Summing Up the Evidence on the Second, or Begum Charge against Warren Hastings, Esq., Delivered before the High Court of Parliament, June 1788”, in Select Speeches, Forensick and Parliamentary, with Prefatory Remarks by N[athaniel] Chapman, M.D., volume I, [Philadelphia, Pa.]: Published by Hopkins and Earle, no. 170, Market Street, published 1808, →OCLC, page 474:

     The Begums' ministers, on the contrary, to extort from them the disclosure of the place which concealed the treasures, were, […] after being fettered and imprisoned, led out on to a scaffold, and this array of terrours proving unavailing, the meek tempered Middleton, as a dernier resort, menaced them with a confinement in the fortress of Chunargar. Thus, my lords, was a British garrison made the climax of cruelties!

   • 2002, David L. Thompson, “River of Memories -An Appalachian Boyhood”, in (Please provide the book title or journal name), page 69:

     Upon leaving the center, I photographed the colorful array of petunias decorating the square in purple, pink, yellow, white, and magenta.

3. An orderly series, arrangement or sequence.
   • 1855–1858, William H[ickling] Prescott, History of the Reign of Philip the Second, King of Spain, volume (please specify |volume=I to III), Boston, Mass.: Phillips, Sampson, and Company, →OCLC:

     But the chivalry of France was represented by as gallant an array of nobles and cavaliers as ever fought under the banner of the lilies

   • 2007 July 25, Felicity Barringer, “California Utility Agrees to Buy Power Generated by Solar Array”, in The New York Times‎^[3]:

     SAN FRANCISCO, July 23 — Pacific Gas & Electric, Northern California’s major utility, is announcing a commitment on Wednesday to purchase 550 megawatts of solar power to be generated by troughlike arrays of mirrors spread over nine square miles in the Mojave Desert.

4. Order; a regular and imposing arrangement; disposition in regular lines; hence, order of battle.

   drawn up in battle array

   • 1776–1788, Edward Gibbon, The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, volume (please specify |volume=I to VI), London: […] W[illiam] Strahan; and T[homas] Cadell, […], →OCLC:

     wedged together in the closest array

5. A large collection.

   We offer a dazzling array of choices.

   • 1814, Lord Byron, “Canto III”, in The Corsair, a Tale, London: […] Thomas Davison, […], for John Murray, […], →OCLC, stanza I, page 64, lines 1218–1211:

     Again his waves in milder tints unfold / Their long array of sapphire and of gold, / Mixt with the shades of many a distant isle, / That frown—where gentler ocean seems to smile.

   • 2011 October 23, Phil McNulty, “Man Utd 1 - 6 Man City”, in BBC Sport‎^[4]:

     Mario Balotelli, in the headlines for accidentally setting his house ablaze with fireworks, put City on their way with goals either side of the interval as United struggled to contain the array of attacking talent in front of them.

6. (mathematics) A matrix.
8. (programming) Any of various data structures designed to hold multiple elements of the same type; especially, a data structure that holds these elements in adjacent memory locations so that they may be retrieved using numeric indices.
9. (law) A ranking or setting forth in order, by the proper officer, of a jury as impanelled in a cause; the panel itself; or the whole body of jurors summoned to attend the court.
10. (military) A militia.
11. A group of hedgehogs.
12. A microarray.

Usage notes

• (any of various data structures): The exact usage of the term array, and of related terms, generally depends on the programming language. For example, many languages distinguish a fairly low-level "array" construct from a higher-level "list" or "vector" construct. Some languages distinguish between an "array" and a variety of "associative array"; others have only the latter concept, calling it an "array".

Antonyms

• (antonym(s) of “orderly series”): disarray

Hyponyms

mathematics: Hyponyms of array

• Costas array
• intersection array
• Monge array
• standard array

 

programming: Hyponyms of array

• associative array
• bit array
• dynamic array
• jagged array
• multidimensional array
• parallel array
• ragged array
• sparse array
• variable-length array

 

technology: Hyponyms of array

• antenna array
• color filter array/colour filter array
• disc array
• gate array
• Halbach array
• linear diode array
• microphone array
• parametric array
• photovoltaic array
• processor array
• reconfigurable datapath array
• staring array
• systolic array
• Video Graphics Array
• Wi-Fi array

 

unsorted hyponyms

• ball grid array
• battle-array
• curtain array
• dense array
• field-programmable gate array
• microneedle array
• multifunction array radar
• programmable logic array
• redundant array of independent disks
• sensor array
• uncommitted logic array
• wi-fi array

 

Derived terms

• array cable
• array controller
• array data structure
• array data type
• array decay
• array gain
• arraylet
• arraylike
• array mbira
• array processing
• array programming
• array slicing
• bioarray
• bitarray
• coarray
• eigenarray
• glycoarray
• ICL Distributed Array Processor
• immunoarray
• Intel Array Visualizer
• interarray
• intraarray
• macroarray
• miniarray
• misarray
• multiarray
• nanoarray
• oligoarray
• phased-array optics
• phosphoarray
• Programmable Array Logic
• reflectarray
• seroarray
• subarray
• Telescope Array Project
• towed array sonar
• transmitarray
• varray

 

Translations

clothing/ornamentation

• Belarusian: убо́р m (ubór), нара́д m (narád), убра́нне n (ubránnje), адзе́нне n (adzjénnje)
• Bulgarian: облекло́ (bg) n (oblekló), носи́я (bg) f (nosíja)
• Finnish: asetelma (fi)
• German: Bekleidung (de) f, Tracht (de) f
• Greek: στολή (el) f (stolí), σύνολο (el) n (sýnolo)
• Italian: abbigliamento (it) m, agghindamento m
• Macedonian: о́блека (mk) f (óbleka)
• Polish: ubiór (pl) m, odzienie (pl) n, obleczenie n, strój (pl) m
• Portuguese: conjunto (pt) m, traje (pt) m
• Russian: убо́р (ru) m (ubór), наря́д (ru) m (narjád), одея́ние (ru) n (odejánije)
• Spanish: atavío (es) m, galas (es) m pl
• Turkish: elbise (tr), giyecek (tr), giyim (tr), giyim kuşam (tr), giyisi (tr)
• Ukrainian: убі́р (uk) m (ubír), убра́ння (uk) n (ubránnja), убрання́ (uk) n (ubrannjá), наря́д m (narjád)
• Zazaki: çına (diq) pl

an orderly series, arrangement or sequence

• Esperanto: aranĝo (eo)
• Macedonian: ред m (red), гру́па f (grúpa)
• Spanish: distribución (es) f, ristra (es) f

collection laid out

• Finnish: sijoittelu
• German: Arrangement (de) n; Feld (de) n; Übersicht (de) f
• Greek: σειρά (el) f (seirá)
• Indonesian: jajaran (id)
• Italian: schieramento (it) m, combinato (it) m
• Portuguese: arranjo (pt) m
• Turkish: aranjman (tr) (flowers, music), düzen (tr), düzenleme (tr), tanzim (tr)
• Zazaki: timar

large collection

• Afrikaans: versameling (af)
• Belarusian: ма́са f (mása), мно́ства n (mnóstva)
• Bulgarian: ма́са (bg) f (mása), мно́жество (bg) n (mnóžestvo)
• Finnish: valikoima (fi), kokoelma (fi)
• French: gamme (fr), kyrielle (fr) f, ribambelle (fr) f, éventail (fr) m
• Galician: gama f
• German: Anzahl (de) f, Feld (de) n, Fülle (de) f, Reihe (de) f, Zahl (de) f
• Greek: σειρά (el) f (seirá), διάταξη (el) f (diátaxi)
• Icelandic: fylki (is) n
• Indonesian: jajaran (id)
• Italian: gamma (it), sfilza (it) f, serie (it) f, assortimento (it) m
• Macedonian: ма́са (mk) f (mása), мно́жество n (mnóžestvo), мно́штво n (mnóštvo)
• Norwegian: samling (no), utvalg (no)
• Portuguese: gama (pt)
• Russian: ма́сса (ru) f (mássa), мно́жество (ru) n (mnóžestvo)
• Spanish: gama (es)
• Swedish: samling (sv) c
• Turkish: adet (tr), bolluk (tr), çokluk (tr), gürlük (tr), miktar (tr) sayı (tr)
• Ukrainian: ма́са (uk) f (mása), множина́ (uk) f (množyná), бе́зліч (uk) f (bézlič)

any of various data structures

• Afrikaans: skikking (af)
• Arabic: مَصْفُوفَة f (maṣfūfa)
• Armenian: զանգված (hy) (zangvac)
• Azerbaijani: massiv
• Belarusian: масі́ў m (masíŭ)
• Bulgarian: маси́в m (masív)
• Catalan: vector m
• Chinese:

  Mandarin: 數組 / 数组 (zh) (shùzǔ), 陣列 / 阵列 (zh) (zhènliè)

• Czech: pole (cs) n
• Dutch: array (nl) m
• Esperanto: tabelo
• Estonian: massiiv
• Finnish: taulukko (fi)
• French: tableau (fr) m
• Galician: vector (gl)
• German: Array (de) n

  Feld (de) n (standard term, general), Datenfeld (de) n;

  Matrix (de) f, Tabelle (de) f (contextual, specific);

  Reihe (de) f, Spalte (de) f, Zeile (de) f (less used, contextual, specific)

• Greek: παράταξη (el) f (parátaxi), σειρά (el) f (seirá)
• Hebrew: מַעֲרָךְ m (ma'arách)
• Hungarian: tömb (hu)
• Icelandic: fylki (is) n
• Italian: array (it) m
• Japanese: 配列 (ja) (はいれつ, hairetsu)
• Kazakh: жиым (jiym), массив (massiv)
• Korean: 배열(配列) (ko) (baeyeol)
• Kyrgyz: массив (massiv)
• Latvian: masīvs m
• Lithuanian: masyvas m
• Macedonian: ни́за f (níza)
• Maori: tūtohi tukutuku, huānga
• Marathi: अ‍ॅरे m (a‍ĕre)
• Mongolian:

  Cyrillic: массив (massiv)

• Norwegian:

  Bokmål: tabell m

• Persian: آرایه (fa) (ârâye)
• Polish: tablica (pl) f
• Portuguese: arranjo (pt) m, array m, vetor (pt) m (unidimensional)
• Russian: масси́в (ru) m (massív)
• Serbo-Croatian:

  Cyrillic: ни̑з

  Roman: nȋz (sh) m

• Slovak: pole n
• Slovene: tabela f
• Spanish: vector (es) m, arreglo (es) m
• Swedish: vektor (sv) c, fält (sv) n
• Tagalog: tugday
• Tajik: массив (massiv)
• Turkish:

  dizi (tr) (standard term, general);

  satır (tr), sıra (tr), sütun (tr)

  çizelge (tr) (contextual, specific), matris (tr)

• Turkmen: massiw
• Ukrainian: маси́в m (masýv)
• Uzbek: massiv (uz)
• Vietnamese: mảng (vi)
• Zazaki: rêz f

The translations below need to be checked and inserted above into the appropriate translation tables. See instructions at Wiktionary:Entry layout § Translations.

Translations to be checked

• Ido: ^{(please verify)} tabelo (io)
• Romanian: ^{(please verify)} tablou (ro) n

See also

• (any of various data structures): ones-based indexing, zero-based indexing

Verb

array (third-person singular simple present arrays, present participle arraying, simple past and past participle arrayed)

1. To clothe and ornament; to adorn or attire.

   He was arrayed in his finest robes and jewels.

   • 1590, Edmund Spenser, “Book II, Canto IX”, in The Faerie Queene. […], London: […] [John Wolfe] for William Ponsonbie, →OCLC, stanza 37, page 317:

     In a long purple pall, whose ſkirt with gold, / Was fretted all about, ſhe was arayd, […]

2. To lay out in an orderly arrangement; to deploy or marshal.
3. (law) To set in order, as a jury, for the trial of a cause; that is, to call them one at a time.
   • 1768, William Blackstone, “Of the Trial by Jury”, in Commentaries on the Laws of England, book III (Of Private Wrongs), Oxford, Oxfordshire: […] Clarendon Press, →OCLC, page 359:

     Alſo, though there be no perſonal objection againſt the ſheriff, yet if he arrays the panel at the nomination, or under the direction of either party, this is good cauſe of challenge to the array.

Synonyms

• (to clothe and ornament): don, dress, put on; see also Thesaurus:clothe or Thesaurus:decorate

Derived terms

• arrayer
• misarrayed
• rearray
• unarrayed

 

Translations

to clothe, ornament

• Bulgarian: обличам (bg) (obličam), украсявам (bg) (ukrasjavam)
• Catalan: arreglar (ca)
• Finnish: pukea (fi), vaatettaa (fi)
• German: schmücken (de), herausputzen (de), auskleiden (de)
• Greek: στολίζω (el) (stolízo)
• Icelandic: klæða (is)
• Japanese: 盛装する (ja) (せいそうする, seisō suru)
• Macedonian: о́блече (óbleče), у́краси (úkrasi)
• Polish: odziewać impf, odziać (pl) pf, oblekać (pl) impf, oblec (pl) pf
• Portuguese: trajar (pt)
• Russian: одева́ть (ru) (odevátʹ), облача́ть (ru) (oblačátʹ)
• Spanish: arreglar (es)
• Turkish: süslemek (tr)

to lay out

• Finnish: sommitella (fi), järjestää (fi), muodostaa (fi)

Portuguese

Etymology

Unadapted borrowing from English array.

Noun

array m (plural arrays)

1. (programming) array (any of various data structures)

   Synonym: vetor