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Definition: Bug |
BugNoun1. General term for any insect or similar creeping or crawling invertebrate. 2. A fault or defect in a system or machine. 3. A small hidden microphone; for listening secretly. 4. Insects with sucking mouthparts and forewings thickened and leathery at the base; usually show incomplete metamorphosis. 5. A minute life form (especially a disease-causing bacterium); the term is not in technical use. Verb1. Annoy persistently; "The children teased the boy because of his stammer". 2. Tap a telephone or telegraph wire to get information; "The FBI was tapping the phone line of the suspected spy"; "Is this hotel room bugged?". Source: WordNet 1.7.1 Copyright © 2001 by Princeton University. All rights reserved. |
Date "bug" was first used in popular English literature: sometime before 1591. (references) |
Etymology: Bug \Bug\, noun. [from Old English expression bugge, from Welsh bwg, bwgan, hobgoblin, scarecrow, bugbear. Compare to Bogey, Boggle.]. (references) |
| Domain | Definition |
Computing | Bug n. An unwanted and unintended property of a program or piece of hardware, esp. one that causes it to malfunction. Antonym of feature. Examples: "There's a bug in the editor: it writes things out backwards." "The system crashed because of a hardware bug." "Fred is a winner, but he has a few bugs" (i.e., Fred is a good guy, but he has a few personality problems). Historical note: Admiral Grace Hopper (an early computing pioneer better known for inventing COBOL) liked to tell a story in which a technician solved a glitch in the Harvard Mark II machine by pulling an actual insect out from between the contacts of one of its relays, and she subsequently promulgated bug in its hackish sense as a joke about the incident (though, as she was careful to admit, she was not there when it happened). For many years the logbook associated with the incident and the actual bug in question (a moth) sat in a display case at the Naval Surface Warfare Center (NSWC). The entire story, with a picture of the logbook and the moth taped into it, is recorded in the "Annals of the History of Computing", Vol. 3, No. 3 (July 1981), pp. 285-286. The text of the log entry (from September 9, 1947), reads "1545 Relay #70 Panel F (moth) in relay. First actual case of bug being found". This wording establishes that the term was already in use at the time in its current specific sense -- and Hopper herself reports that the term `bug' was regularly applied to problems in radar electronics during WWII. Indeed, the use of `bug' to mean an industrial defect was already established in Thomas Edison's time, and a more specific and rather modern use can be found in an electrical handbook from 1896 ("Hawkin's New Catechism of Electricity", Theo. Audel & Co.) which says: "The term `bug' is used to a limited extent to designate any fault or trouble in the connections or working of electric apparatus." It further notes that the term is "said to have originated in quadruplex telegraphy and have been transferred to all electric apparatus." The latter observation may explain a common folk etymology of the term; that it came from telephone company usage, in which "bugs in a telephone cable" were blamed for noisy lines. Though this derivation seems to be mistaken, it may well be a distorted memory of a joke first current among _telegraph_ operators more than a century ago! Or perhaps not a joke. Historians of the field inform us that the term "bug" was regularly used in the early days of telegraphy to refer to a variety of semi-automatic telegraphy keyers that would send a string of dots if you held them down. In fact, the Vibroplex keyers (which were among the most common of this type) even had a graphic of a beetle on them (and still do)! While the ability to send repeated dots automatically was very useful for professional morse code operators, these were also significantly trickier to use than the older manual keyers, and it could take some practice to ensure one didn't introduce extraneous dots into the code by holding the key down a fraction too long. In the hands of an inexperienced operator, a Vibroplex "bug" on the line could mean that a lot of garbled Morse would soon be coming your way. Further, the term "bug" has long been used among radio technicians to describe a device that converts electromagnetic field variations into acoustic signals. It is used to trace radio interference and look for dangerous radio emissions. Radio community usage derives from the roach-like shape of the first versions used by 19th century physicists. The first versions consisted of a coil of wire (roach body), with the two wire ends sticking out and bent back to nearly touch forming a spark gap (roach antennae). The bug is to the radio technician what the stethoscope is to the stereotypical medical doctor. This sense is almost certainly ancestral to modern use of "bug" for a covert monitoring device, but may also have contributed to the use of "bug" for the effects of radio interference itself. Actually, use of `bug' in the general sense of a disruptive event goes back to Shakespeare! (Henry VI, part III - Act V, Scene II: King Edward: "So, lie thou there. Die thou; and die our fear; For Warwick was a bug that fear'd us all.") In the first edition of Samuel Johnson's dictionary one meaning of `bug' is "A frightful object; a walking spectre"; this is traced to `bugbear', a Welsh term for a variety of mythological monster which (to complete the circle) has recently been reintroduced into the popular lexicon through fantasy role-playing games. In any case, in jargon the word almost never refers to insects. Here is a plausible conversation that never actually happened: "There is a bug in this ant farm!" "What do you mean? I don't see any ants in it." "That's the bug." A careful discussion of the etymological issues can be found in a paper by Fred R. Shapiro, 1987, "Entomology of the Computer Bug: History and Folklore", American Speech 62(4):376-378. [There has been a widespread myth that the original bug was moved to the Smithsonian, and an earlier version of this entry so asserted. A correspondent who thought to check discovered that the bug was not there. While investigating this in late 1990, your editor discovered that the NSWC still had the bug, but had unsuccessfully tried to get the Smithsonian to accept it -- and that the present curator of their History of American Technology Museum didn't know this and agreed that it would make a worthwhile exhibit. It was moved to the Smithsonian in mid-1991, but due to space and money constraints was not actually exhibited for years afterwards. Thus, the process of investigating the original-computer-bug bug fixed it in an entirely unexpected way, by making the myth true! --ESR]. Source: Jargon File. |
Finance | It rewards home buyers for choosing compact neighborhoods served by public transit. Source: European Union. (references) |
Labor | A tag, imprint or design affixed to a product to show it was made by union labour. Source: European Union. (references) |
Mining | A. A bullet or go-devil. See also:bulletb. Syn. for vug and bug hole (slang). (references) |
Slang in 1811 | BUG. A nick name given by the Irish to Englishmen; bugs having, as it is said, been introduced into Ireland by the English. Source: 1811 Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue. |
Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |
(From Wikipedia, the free Encyclopedia)
The word bug has a number of possible interpretations in English. It is usually used colloquially to denote very small animals (such as insects, spiders, snails, slugs, etc). From this meaning stem many others.1. When used to denote animals, a bug is often and incorrectly used in vernacular to refer to any small, terrestrial arthropod, sometimes taken to include creatures like snails and slugs as well.
Since such insects are often irritating and frustrating (mosquitoes, flies and cockroaches being prime examples of such), this word has also come to refer to something which is irritating or frustrating. For instance, a person might say someone (or a problem) is "bugging" (irritating or frustrating) them.
2. A bug is, however, a precise scientific term that refers to insects of the orders Hemiptera and Homoptera.
3. This term is also often used in a computer context, to refer to a computer program which is frustrating them. The most common usage of this is when a computer program does not perform the function that it is supposed to, while the error in its programming cannot be found. See computer bug.
4. Since it refers to small animals, the term bug is also occasionally (and inaccurately) used to refer to microscopic life forms. Somebody might refer to have caught the "pneumonia bug", for instance.
5. A further extension of this meaning is to small surveillance devices. This can be seen as an extension of the existing meaning of something which is small and irritating (the possible presence of surveillance bugs acts as a detriment to free speech in any context). See bugging.
6. Bug is also the name of two rivers in eastern Europe, the Western and Southern Bug. See Bug (Rivers).
7. In gambling jargon, a bug is a small holdout device that can secretly be attached at the under side of the card table for the purpose of cheating. A card cheat will use a bug to conceal extra cards under the table for further use.
8. In a flight instrument, a bug is a manually positioned marker or pointer which is set to remind the pilot where the needle on the instrument should be pointing. This helps her avoid the need to hold settings in her head, and can then just fly to keep the needle aligned with the bug.
Source: adapted by the editor from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia under a copyleft GNU Free Documentation License (GFDL) from the article "Bug."
(From Wikipedia, the free Encyclopedia)
Bug is Dinosaur Jr's third album, which was released in October 1988 through SST Records.
Track listing
- "Freak Scene"
- "No Bones"
- "They Always Come"
- "Yeah We Know"
- "Let It Ride"
- "Pond Song"
- "Budge"
- "The Post"
- "Don't"
Source: adapted by the editor from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia under a copyleft GNU Free Documentation License (GFDL) from the article "Bug (album)."
(From Wikipedia, the free Encyclopedia)
A bug in poker is a limited form of wild card. One or both jokers are often added to the deck and played as bugs. The bug is played as an ace unless designating it as a different card would complete a straight, flush, or straight flush. For example, the hand K-K-Joker-5-2 is just a pair of kings (with an ace Kicker), but any four same-suit cards with a bug make a flush, and a hand such as 7-Joker-5-4-3 makes a straight.Source: adapted by the editor from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia under a copyleft GNU Free Documentation License (GFDL) from the article "Bug (poker)."
(From Wikipedia, the free Encyclopedia)
Bug is the name of two rivers in Europe, alternatively spelt Boog.The better known of the two, also known as the Western Bug, flows from the central Ukraine to the west, forming part of the boundary between that nation and Poland. It is 724 km (450 mi) long.
The other Bug River, this one sometimes known as the Southern Bug, is entirely located in Ukraine. It rises in the west, about 90 miles from the Polish border, and flows southeasterly into the Black Sea. It is 853 km (530 mi) long.
For other kinds of bugs, see Bug.
Source: adapted by the editor from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia under a copyleft GNU Free Documentation License (GFDL) from the article "Bug (Rivers)."
(From Wikipedia, the free Encyclopedia)
Bug Pokémon are a certain type of Pokémon, including the following:
This list will be expanded as more Pokémon entries are created on Wikipedia.
- Basic Pokémon
- Caterpie
- Weedle
- Stage 1 Pokémon
- Kakuna
- Metapod
- Stage 2 Pokémon
- Beedrill
- Butterfree
Source: adapted by the editor from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia under a copyleft GNU Free Documentation License (GFDL) from the article "Bug Pokmon."
(From Wikipedia, the free Encyclopedia)
A computer bug is a fault in a computer program which prevents it from working correctly. Bugs arise from mistakes in either a program's source code or its design. It is said that there are bugs in all useful computer programs, but well-written programs contain relatively few bugs, and these bugs typically do not prevent the program from performing its task. Buggy programs are those which contain a large number of bugs, and/or bugs which seriously interfere with the program's functionality.
Overview
Bugs can have a wide variety of effects, with varying levels of inconvenience to the user of the program. Some bugs have only a subtle effect on the program's functionality, and may thus lie undetected for a long time. More serious bugs may cause the program to crash or freeze. In some operating systems, such as Microsoft Windows, crashing or freezing programs may render the computer unusable until it is rebooted (see blue screen of death.) Other bugs lead to security problems; for example, a common type of bug called a buffer overflow may allow a malicious user to execute a new program that is normally not allowed to run.
The results of bugs may be extremely serious. In 1962, an omitted hyphen in a Fortran program led to the loss of the Mariner 1 Venus probe, which cost over $80 million; Arthur C. Clarke dubbed this "the most expensive hyphen in history". In 1996, the European Space Agency's prototype Ariane 5 rocket was destroyed less than a minute after launch due to a bug in the on-board guidance computer, costing over US$1 billion.
Etymology
The term "bug" derives from hardware engineering jargon, in which it refers to errors in hardware. The term is often (but erroneously) credited to Grace Hopper, through an anecdote where she determined the reason for a malfunction on an early electromechanical computer was an actual insect stuck between the contacts of the relays that drove the device:
Photo of first computer bug.
Click for larger version
Despite the colourfulness of the above anecdote, it is known that the use of the word "bug" to describe defects in mechanical systems dates back to at least the 1870s. Thomas Edison, for one, used the term in his notebooks.
- In 1946, when Hopper was released from active duty, she joined the Harvard Faculty at the Computation Laboratory where she continued her work on the Mark II and Mark III. She traced an error in the Mark II to a moth trapped in a relay, coining the term bug. This bug was carefully removed and taped to the log book. Stemming from the first bug, today we call errors or glitch's in a program a bug. [1]
Preventing bugs
Bugs are a consequence of the nature of the programming task. Some bugs arise from simple oversights made when a computer programmer writes source code carelessly. Many off-by-one errors fall into this category. Other bugs arise from unintended interactions between different parts of a computer program. This happens because computer programs are often complex, so that programmers are unable to mentally keep track of every possible way in which different parts can interact. Many race condition bugs fall into this category.
The computer software industry has put a great deal of effort into finding methods for preventing programmers from inadvertently introducing bugs while writing software. These include:
There is also a great amount of efforts devoted to detecting bugs, mostly around the concepts of type systems and program verification.
- Programming techniques. Bugs often create inconsistencies in the internal data of a running program. Programs can be written to check the consistency of their own internal data while running. If an inconsistency is encountered, the program can immediately halt, so that the bug can be located and fixed. Alternatively, the program can simply inform the user, attempt to correct the inconsistency, and continue running.
- Development methodologies. There are several schemes for managing programmer activity, so that fewer bugs are produced. Many of these fall under the discipline of software engineering (which addresses software design issues as well.)
- Programming language support. Programming languages often include features which help programmers deal with bugs, such as exception handling. In addition, many recently-invented languages have deliberately excluded features which can easily lead to bugs. For example, the Java programming language does not support pointer arithmetic.
Debugging
Finding and fixing bugs, or "debugging", has always been a major part of computer programming. Maurice Wilkes, an early computing pioneer, describes his realization in the late 1940s that much of the rest of his life would be spent finding mistakes in his own programs. As computer programs grow more complex, bugs become more common and difficult to fix. Often, programmers spend more time and effort finding and fixing bugs than writing new code.
Usually, the most difficult part of debugging is locating the erroneous part of the source code. Once the mistake is found, correcting it is usually easy. Programs known as debuggers exist to help programmers locate bugs. However, even with the aid of a debugger, locating bugs is something of an art.
Typically, the first step in locating a bug is finding a way to reproduce it easily. Once the bug is reproduced, the programmer can use a debugger or some other tool to monitor the execution of the program in the faulty region, and (eventually) find the problem. However, it is not always easy to reproduce bugs. Some bugs are triggered by inputs to the program which may be difficult for the programmer to re-create. Other bugs may disappear when the program is run with a debugger; these are heisenbugs (humorously named after the Heisenberg uncertainty principle.)
List of computer bugs
The following is a list of famous computer bugs:
Space exploration
- ESA Ariane 5 taking off (1996 June 4).
- NASA Apollo 11 landing problem (1969 July 20).
- NASA Mariner 1 FORTRAN's DO missing decimal comma bug (1962 July 22).
- NASA Mars Climate Orbiter (1999) failed to convert yards to meters.
- NASA Voyager 2 (1986 January 24).
- Phobos 1 (1988 September 10).
Medical
- The Therac-25 accidents (1985-1987), quite possibly the most serious computer-related failure ever in terms of human life lost.
Computing
- Pentium FDIV bug
- The year 2000 problem, popularly known as the "Y2K bug", spawned fears of worldwide economic collapse and an industry of consultants providing last-minute fixes
Science fiction
- Douglas Adams' Deep Thought's 42 - "Ah But what is the question bug.
- Arthur C. Clarke's HAL 9000's bug.
Common types of computer bugs
- Divide by zero
- Infinite loops
- Arithmetic overflow or underflow
- Exceeding array bounds
- Using an unitialized variable
- Accessing memory not owned (Access violation)
- Memory leak
- Stack overflow or underflow
- Buffer overflow
- Deadlock
- Off by one error
External links and References
See also: Bugzilla
- Thomas Huckle of TU München extensive page on computer bugs: http://wwwzenger.informatik.tu-muenchen.de/persons/huckle/bugse.html
- Nachum Dershowitz's page on computer bugs: http://www.cs.tau.ac.il/~nachumd/verify/horror.html
- N. Leveson and C. Turner: An Investigation of the Therac-25 Accidents: http://courses.cs.vt.edu/~cs3604/lib/Therac_25/Therac_1.html
- Rose, Barbara Wade: Fatal Dose - Radiation Deaths linked to AECL Computer Errors (producers of the Therac-25): http://www.ccnr.org/fatal_dose.html
- picture of the first computer bug
Source: adapted by the editor from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia under a copyleft GNU Free Documentation License (GFDL) from the article "Computer bug."
(From Wikipedia, the free Encyclopedia)
A 'bug' is the common name for a covert listening device, usually a combination of a miniature radio transmitter with a microphone. The use of bugs, called bugging is a common technique in espionage and an increasingly common one in police investigations.A covert listening device on a person (also known as a "wire") is often used to gain evidence for criminal prosecutions.
The first bugs were designed by Leon Theremin.
Surveillance devices require a communications channel. The idea of a 'bug' usually involves a radio transmitter, but there are many other options for carrying a signal; you can send radio frequencies through the main wiring of a building and pick them up outside, you can pick up the transmissions from a cordless phones, and you can pick up the data from poorly configured wireless computer networks or tune in to the radio emissions of a computer monitor.
Bugs come in all shapes and sizes. The original purpose of bugs was to relay sound. Today the miniaturisation of electronics has progressed so far then even TV pictures can be broadcast via bugs that incorporate miniature video cameras (something made popular recently during TV coverage sports events, etc.).
Older bugs used the VHF radio band. Modern bugs, thanks to the developments in electronics for mobile phones, work in the UHF and microwave bands. The use of digital rather than analogue technology means that the most professional bugs can encrypt the output signal, and change the frequency of operation in a pseudo-random pattern to make finding them harder. The range of these bugs varies from a few hundred yards to a few miles. Some of the state's bugging devices are even linked to satellite systems. There is a growing commercial market in surveillance devices such as audio and CCTV bugs, mainly for observing people in the workplace. Officially very little of this equipment is used for spying on the activities of pressure groups - but the potential is there.
Amateur bugs are usually the size of a cigarette packet. Professional bugs can fit into pens, calculators and other commonplace items. Some are only the size of small shirt buttons - but the power and operation life of the smallest bugs is very short.
The devices used by persons or organisations without the funding to buy professional equipment are crude. These devices can be bought from electronics magazines, and designs to build them are available on the Internet. They tend to broadcast in or around the VHF frequency band. They are also fairly bulky because they are made from ordinary electrical components and need a conventional battery power supply. However a well-made amateur bug can be just as effective as a professional one for conducting surveillance.
Another great problem with modern technology is the development of 'wireless' appliances. To be 'wireless' a device must transmit information, either by radio waves or infra-red light, and this potentially makes all the information sent via that link available to others. Radio waves are the worst option, but even infra-red can be picked up through a window. Some wireless devices, such as wireless computer networks, do encrypt transmissions, but the standard forms of encryption are weak.
Wireless devices, be it a wireless keyboard or a wireless telephone, should not be used in any environment where sensitive information is handled.
Bugs emit radio waves. The standard counter-measure for bugs is therefore to 'sweep' for them with a receiver, looking for the radio emissions. Professional sweeping devices are very expensive. There are low-tech sweeping devices available, through amateur electrical magazines, or that can be built from circuit designs on the Internet. But sweeping is not fool proof. Advanced bugs can be remotely operated to switch on and off, and some even rapidly switch frequencies according to a pre-determined pattern in order to make location with sweepers more difficult. You may also be bugged, but you don't detect it when you sweep because it's run out of power.
The other problem are those bugs that do not emit radio waves - they are very difficult to detect. Bugs are a technical solution to a problem - remotely listening to people's conversations. A simpler option is simply to record the conversation on a normal recording machine. There are a number of options for this:
If a microphone is hidden in a room it is almost impossible to detect it. This is because it has no radio emission. Very sensitive equipment could be used to look for magnetic fields or electrical noise emanating from the recording equipment. This is because the computerised/digital technology in digital tape recorders emits characteristic electrical noise. But if the place being monitored has lots of computers, photocopiers and other electrical equipment installed that would be very difficult. Older analogue equipment is very difficult to detect.
- Pocket sized devices, either worn or carried in baggage, linked to a small microphone that's usually mounted on the surface to pick up the audio. Digital recording devices, such as minidisc or the latest palm-sized camcorders, also give very high quality recordings in a very small device.
- Larger recording devices hidden in the room, for example above suspended ceilings. These are popular in workplaces for monitoring staff.
- Ultra directional microphones. These are like the microphones you see on camcorders, or carried by sound technicians. They are constructed to receive signals only from one direction. The most high-tech directional microphones can eavesdrop on conversations from a hundred metres away or more.
- Laser microphones. These are very expensive and highly technical to operate. You bounce a laser beam of a window, or off some object near the conversation you want to hear that resonates (for example, a picture on a wall). Any object which can resonate/vibrate will do so in response to the pressure waves created by noises present in a room. The electronics detect the minute difference in the distance travelled by the light to pick up this resonance, and reproduce the sound causing that resonance.
Bugging devices in EU headquarters
Electronic bugging devices were found in March 2003 at offices used by French and German delegations at European Union headquarters in Brussels. Devices were also discovered at offices used by other delegations. The discovery of the telephone tapping systems was first reported by Le Figaro newspaper, which blamed the US.External links
See also:
- communications interception
- eavesdropping
- surveillance
Source: adapted by the editor from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia under a copyleft GNU Free Documentation License (GFDL) from the article "Covert listening device."
| The following table is compiled from various sources, across various languages. When English abbreviations or acronyms come from a non-English source, this is noted. | |||
| Entry | Source | Expression | Field |
BUG | English | Brooklyn Union Gas | Computing, Electrical Engineering |
Source: compiled by the editor, based on several corpora (additional references). | |||
Synonyms: BugSynonyms: germ (n), glitch (n), hemipteran (n), hemipteron (n), hemipterous insect (n), microbe (n), badger (v), beleaguer (v), harass (v), intercept (v), pester (v), tap (v), tease (v), wiretap (v). (additional references) |
| Context | Synonyms within Context (source: adapted from Roget's Thesaurus). |
Bad Man | Incendiary, arsonist, fire bug. |
Evil doer | Firebrand, incendiary, fire bug, pyromaniac; anarchist, communist, terrorist. |
Fear | Bug bear, bugaboo; scarecrow; hobgoblin; (demon); nightmare, Gorgon, mormo, ogre, Hurlothrumbo, raw head and bloody bones, fee-faw-fum, bete noire, enfant terrible. |
Nobility | Personage of distinction, man of distinction, personage of rank, man of rank, personage of mark, man of mark; notables, notabilities; celebrity, bigwig, magnate, great man, star, superstar; big bug; big gun, great gun; gilded rooster; magni nominis umbra; " every inch a king ". |
Uncleanness | Riffraff; vermin, louse, flea, bug, chinch. |
| Source: adapted from Roget's Thesaurus. | |
| Domain | Usage | |
Screenplays | The only good bug is a dead bug (Starship Troopers; writing credit: Edward Neumeier. Based on the novel by Robert A. Heinlein.) Sounded like an annoying bug asking me irritating questions (101 Dalmatians; writing credit: John Hughes) To kill the bug you have up your ass. (Terms of Endearment; writing credit: Larry McMurtry; James L. Brooks) I hate this bug. (Outbreak; writing credit: Laurence Dworet; Robert Roy Pool) Please move to the forward car, we've got a bug in the system (Men in Black II; writing credit: Lowell Cunningham; Robert Gordon) | |
Lyrics | I hate to bug you in the middle of dinner (You Oughta Know; performing artist: Alanis Morissette) Well baby, you know you bug me (Pink Cadillac; performing artist: Natalie Cole) If you really bug me then I'll say goodbye (Wannabe; performing artist: Spice Girls) | |
Tongue Twisters | A big bug bit a bold bald bear, and the bold bald bear bled blood badly. (references; author: unknown) | |
Movie/TV Titles | Camera Bug (1972) Dune Bug (1969) Never Bug an Ant (1969) The Love Bug (1968) Bugged by a Bug (1967) | |
Song Titles | Bug Eyed Monster (performing artist: Jordin Kare) | |
Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | ||
| Domain | Title | ||
Books |
| ||
Theater & Movies | |||
Music |
| ||
High Tech |
| ||
Consumer Goods | |||
Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |||
| Thumbnail | Description & Credit | Thumbnail | Description & Credit |
 | The alfalfa plant bug, Adelphocoris lineolatus, is a non-native plant pest. P. Credit: USDA ARS News; photo by Scott Bauer.. |  | Having glued a hapless whitefly to a leaf, the big-eyed bug can devour its prey at its leisure. P. Credit: USDA ARS News; photo by Jack Dykinga.. |
 | Moored in port, circa 1917-1919. This motor boat was acquired by the Navy on 25 June 1917 and commissioned on 9 August 1917. Stricken on 24 April 1919, she was wrecked along with seven other "SP" boats in a hurricane at Key West, Florida, while awaiting sale in September 1919. The Herreshoff-type patrol boat in the left background appears to be USS War Bug (SP-1795). Credit: NAVY. |  | At anchor prior to her World War I Navy service. One of nine 62'4" boats built by Herreshoff, of Bristol, Rhode Island, specifically for Naval service, and known initially as Herreshoff Hull 316, this craft was taken over by the Navy and placed in commission on 18 September 1917 as USS Kangaroo (SP-1284). She was transferred to the Treasury Department on 22 November 1919. This photograph, in which the name "Kangaroo" is faintly visible on the boat's pilothouse, was also used on the contemporary "SP" record cards of two sisters: Daiquiri (SP-1285) and War Bug (SP-1795). Credit: NAVY. |
 | N. Tom o' logical studies. The great tumble bug of Missouri, bent-on rollin his ball. Credit: Library of Congress. |  | Glenn Curtiss(?), three-quarter length portrait, facing right, seated at wheel of the June Bug, an airplane. Credit: Library of Congress. |
 | Bug Light, Boston, Mass. Credit: Library of Congress. |  | "We're living in a tent because we wouldn't pay anyone thirty or thirty-five dollars for a two-room bug trap." Mission Valley, California, which is about three miles from San Diego. Credit: Library of Congress. |
 | Isleta, New Mexico. Engineer of a passenger train on the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railroad picking up a message passed to him by the agent, by hand. This diesel train called the "Doodle Bug" makes all local stops. Credit: Library of Congress. |  | Lady bug, lady bug, fly away! / G.G. Fish, after Anderson, 1872. Credit: Library of Congress. |
Source: pictures compiled by the editor from various references; see picture credits. | |||
 |  |
| "Bug" by Balazs G Commentary: "A bug on a table." | "Bug" by Emanouel V. Commentary: "A bug on a grey clothe." |
Source: photographs selected by the editor, with permission from the photographers. | |
| Play | Caption |
 | Repetitive piano arpeggios with lots of digital bug and insect sounds. |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |
| Title | Author | Quote |
Les Miserables | Hugo, Victor | Ah! you take the bug by the horns |
Grapes of Wrath | Steinbeck, John | A lamp bug slammed into the lantern and broke itself, and fell into the darkness |
Source: compiled by the editor from various references. | ||
| Subject | Topic | Quote |
Health | Infection is spread to humans when an infected bug deposits feces on a person’s skin, usually while the person is sleeping at night. (references) | |
Business | With the millennium bug problem surmounted and the economic improvement expected this year, industry growth is expected to be even higher. (references) | |
Some of the current delays can be traced to a bug in some of the early Nokia WAP phones that Vodafone ordered and returned due to an initial glitch. (references) | ||
Cash-cows for these companies in 1999 were the implementation of standard software; testing and updating of existing programs to avoid computer problems caused by the millennium bug; consulting services for implementation of Internet applications. (references) | ||
Economic History | Kenya | However, the banking sector remained relatively stable in 2000 despite the apprehension that gripped the banking industry at the turn of the century due to the anticipated millennium bug problems. (references) |
Political Economy | THE BAHAMAS | In June 1996, the Ministry announced a ban on the importation of fruits, vegetables, flowers, plants or other propagate materials from Caribbean countries unless the Department of Agriculture is assured that the country is free of the pink (or hibiscus) mealy bug. (references) |
Trade | Ukraine | Located on the Black Sea, the Sea of Azov, and the rivers Danube, Yuzhniy Bug and Dnieper, they are currently under the authority of the Ministry of Transportation's Department of Sea and River Transport. (references) |
Source: compiled by the editor from ICON Group International, Inc.; see credits. | ||
| Speaker | Phrase(s) |
Gene Wilder | Pompea! She was his wife, and she was unfaithful to him. So he got mad and he jumped on her, up and down, up and down, until he squashed her like a bug! Please don't jump on me! |
Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |
| "Bug" is generally used as a noun (singular) -- approximately 88.47% of the time. "Bug" is used about 295 times out of a sample of 100 million words spoken or written in English. Its rank is based on over 700,000 words used in the English language. Some parts-of-speech are not covered due to the samples used by the British National Corpus. (note: percents less than one-hundredth of one percent have been omitted) |
| Parts of Speech | Percent | Usage per 100 Million Words | Rank in English |
| Noun (singular) | 88.47% | 261 | 18,276 |
| Lexical Verb (infinitive) | 6.78% | 20 | 78,262 |
| Noun (proper) | 2.71% | 8 | 124,375 |
| Lexical Verb (base form) | 2.03% | 6 | 143,867 |
| Total | 100.00% | 295 | N/A |
Source: compiled by the editor from several corpora; see credits.
Expressions using "bug": aliasing bug ♦ assassin bug ♦ Bait bug ♦ barber bug fever ♦ bed bug ♦ big bug ♦ boat bug ♦ Bohr bug ♦ brown paper bag bug ♦ Buffalo bug ♦ bug fix ♦ bug fix release ♦ bug hole ♦ bug out ♦ bug seeding ♦ bug Tracking System ♦ Bug word ♦ calico bug ♦ Carpet bug ♦ chinch bug ♦ chink bug ♦ Coffee bug ♦ conenose bug ♦ coreid bug ♦ croton bug ♦ Damsel bug ♦ fire bug ♦ furniture bug ♦ giant water bug ♦ harlequin cabbage bug ♦ harvest bug ♦ horned bug ♦ June bug ♦ kissing bug ♦ lace bug ♦ leaf bug ♦ lightning bug ♦ litter bug ♦ lygaeid bug ♦ lygus bug ♦ may bug ♦ mealy bug ♦ Miana bug ♦ millennium bug ♦ mirid bug ♦ negro bug ♦ pea bug ♦ pill bug ♦ Pinacate bug ♦ plant bug ♦ potato bug ♦ put a bug in smb.'s ear ♦ red bug ♦ rose bug ♦ salve bug ♦ sand bug ♦ scorpion bug ♦ sea bug ♦ snap bug ♦ soldier bug ♦ sow bug ♦ spined soldier bug ♦ squash bug ♦ stale pointer bug ♦ stink bug ♦ tarnished plant bug ♦ Tea bug ♦ tickle a bug ♦ Tree bug ♦ true bug ♦ W2K bug ♦ water bug ♦ wheel bug ♦ Y2K bug ♦ year 2000 bug. Additional references. | |
| Hyphenated Usage | |
Beginning with "bug": bug-bear, bug-compatible, bug-detectors, bug-eyed, bug-eyes, bug-fighting, bug-fix, bug-fixes, bug-fixing, bug-for-bug, bug-for-bug compatible, bug-free, bug-hunter, bug-hunting, bug-infested, bug-like, bug-of-the-month club, bug-out, bug-ridden, bug-run. | |
Ending with "bug": buffalo-bug, bug-for-bug, day-bug, Dniepr-bug, doodle-bug, dor-bug, glitter-bug, gold-bug, harvest-bug, jitter-bug, kite-bug, Lady-bug, micro-bug, scale-bug, spittle-bug, tummy-bug. | |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |
| The following statistics estimate the number of searches per day across the major English-language search engines as identified by various trade publications. Hyperlinks lead to commercial use of the expression at Amazon.com. |
| Expression | Frequency per Day | Expression | Frequency per Day |
bug | 3,487 | bug picture | 232 |
the weather bug | 3,175 | bug zappers | 193 |
fashion bug | 3,157 | lady bug tattoo | 186 |
bug bunny | 2,768 | lady bug picture | 185 |
bug life | 2,566 | bug shield | 181 |
lady bug | 1,828 | bug bear | 167 |
bed bug | 843 | pill bug | 158 |
vw bug | 784 | palmetto bug | 150 |
june bug | 633 | chinch bug | 142 |
bug control | 451 | bug deflectors | 142 |
bug zapper | 438 | bug spray | 141 |
bug bite | 425 | the love bug | 139 |
potato bug | 355 | bug bear virus | 135 |
water bug | 319 | bug deflector | 126 |
lightning bug | 310 | lady bug cake | 125 |
bug hall | 282 | search bug | 124 |
volkswagen bug | 274 | bug music | 123 |
bug bunny picture | 262 | stink bug | 120 |
bug tracking | 250 | bug juice | 118 |
baja bug | 247 | mealy bug | 111 |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |||
| Language | Translations for "bug"; alternative meanings/domain in parentheses. | |
Albanian | virus (virus), tartabiq (bedbug), insekt (insect), çimkë (bedbug, chinch). (various references) | |
Arabic | نعرض لإصابة, حشرة (insect, mealy bug, roach), خنفساء (beetle), جرثوم (bacterium), بق. (various references) | |
Bulgarian | щуротия (foolery), технически дефект, буболечка, дървеница (bedbug, chinch). (various references) | |
Catalan | insecte (insect). (various references) | |
Chinese | 臭虫, 飛蟲 . (various references) | |
Czech | brouk (beetle, coleopteran, dor-bug), bacil (bacillus, germ), virus (virus), vir, porucha (breakdown, defect, derangement, disorder, failure, fault, lesion), otravovat (annoy, bore, bother, hassle, nag, nark, peeve, pester, worry), štìnice (bedbug, chinch). (various references) | |
Danish | skraber (disc scraper, doctor, doctor blade, doctor knife, drag hooks, dredge, flight, go-devil, knife, paddle, pig, pipeline cleaner, pipeline scraper, scraper, squeegee), rørrenser (go-devil, pig, pipeline cleaner, pipeline scraper), positionsindikator, insekt (insect). (various references) | |
Dutch | wandluis (bedbug), Boeg (bow, prow). (various references) | |
Esperanto | Bugo, kaŝaŭskulti (eavesdrop, listen in, monitor, tap), insekto (insect), cimo (bedbug). (various references) | |
Faeroese | flogkykt (insect). (various references) | |
Farsi | حشره (Insect), ساس , جوجو, بطورپنهانی درمحلی میکروفون نصب کرد. (various references) | |
Finnish | putkipossu (go-devil, pig, pipeline cleaner, pipeline scraper), possu (go-devil, pig, pipeline cleaner, pipeline scraper), lutikka (bed bug), hyönteinen (insect). (various references) | |
French | punaise, insecte. (various references) | |
Frisian | ynsekt (insect), ôfharkje (eavesdrop, listen in, monitor, tap). (various references) | |
German | wanze (bedbug, bugging device), fehler (aberration, absence, blemish, defect, deficiency, demerits, error, failing, fault, flaw, flaws, lack, lapse, misstep, mistake, mistakes, nonconformance, shortage, shortcoming, slip, slipup, solecism, trip, vise). (various references) | |
Greek | κοριόσ (bedbug), έντομο (hopper, insect), μικρόβιο (bacillus, bacterium, germ, microbe, virus), μαμούδι, ζουζούνι. (various references) | |
Hebrew | לצותת (eavesdrop, listen in, tap, tap the wires), פשפש (bedbug), חפושית (beetle). (various references) | |
Hungarian | rovar (digger, insect, pest), poloska (bedbug, chinch, pitting), bogár (beetle, maggot, whim, whimsy). (various references) | |
Indonesian | sadap (tap), menyadap (sample blood, tap), kutu busuk. (various references) | |
Italian | insetto (insect), origliare (eavesdrop, listen in, monitor, overhear, tap). (various references) | |
Japanese Kanji | 昆虫 (insect). (various references) | |
Japanese Katakana | バッグ (bag), バグ , こんちゅう (insect, sound post), とうちょうき (listening device, wiretap), とうちょう (attending a government office, climbing to the summit, interception, island government office, isotonic, parietal, Tang Dynasty, top of the head, vertex, wiretap). (various references) | |
Korean | 벌레 (WORM, WORMS). (various references) | |
Manx | doghan (ailment, disease, disorder, infection, sickness), cur eaishteyder ayn, carthan (tick). (various references) | |
Norwegian | insekt (insect). (various references) | |
Papiamen | insekto (insect). (various references) | |
Pig Latin | ugbay.(various references) | |
Portuguese | percevejo (barnacle, bedbug, chinch, thumbtack), inseto (feeler, insect, jack-straw), insecto (flier, insect). (various references) | |
Romanian | bacterie (bacteria, germ), ploşniţã (bedbug), gândac (beetle), dificultate neprevãzutã. (various references) | |
Romansch | bau. (various references) | |
Russian | клоп (B flat, bed-bug, Norfolk Howard), насекомое (bedbug, insect), жук (beetle, dor, dor-beetle, dor-bug, dorr), безумная идея. (various references) | |
Sepedi | tahitahidi. (various references) | |
Serbo-Croatian | buba (beetle, insect), stenica (bedbug), prislušni uređaj (tap), kvar (breakage, breakdown, damage, failure, malfunction, trouble). (various references) | |
Spanish | insecto (blackfly, crotonbug, dor, dor-bug, insect), error (aberrancy, aberration, error, fallacy, fault, foozle, inadvertence, inadvertency, lapse, misapprehension, miscalculation, misdeed, misdoing, Miss, mistake, misunderstanding, wrong), bicho (Dong, insect, small animal, vermin). (various references) | |
Swahili | mdudu (insect). (various references) | |
