Copyright © Philip M. Parker, INSEAD. Terms of Use.
Definition: Patchy |
PatchyAdjective1. Irregular or uneven in quality, texture, etc.; "a patchy essay"; "patchy fog". Source: WordNet 1.7.1 Copyright © 2001 by Princeton University. All rights reserved. |
Date "patchy" was first used in popular English literature: sometime before 1897. (references) |
| Domain | Definitions |
Computing | PATCHY A Fortran code management program written at CERN. Source: The Free On-line Dictionary of Computing. |
Mining | Distributed in an irregular manner, as when ore occurs in bunches orsporadically. (references) |
Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |
Crosswords: Patchy |
| English words defined with "patchy": alopecia areata ♦ brinded, brindle, brindled ♦ livedo ♦ tabby. (references) |
| Specialty definitions using "patchy": borehole spacing ♦ E-region ♦ hippy velour ♦ locally contaminated site ♦ neonatorum ♦ stratocumulus ♦ wild suede. (references) |
| Domain | Title |
Books | |
Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |
| Thumbnail | Description & Credit | Thumbnail | Description & Credit |
 | A patient with typical "nickel and dime" lesions on the face, which can develop during secondary syphilis. Other symptoms that may occur during this stage are mild fever, fatigue, headache, sore throat, patchy hair loss, and swollen lymph glands.Credit: CDC. |  | Setting up planting sites at Barren Island for patchy and continuous planting areas. The sites were marked and designated in advance.Credit: NOAA Restoration Center. |
 | A restoration planting site designated to receive patchy plantings. The planting area is designated by flags.Credit: NOAA Restoration Center. |  | Marking locations for patchy plantings.Credit: NOAA Restoration Center. |
 | The plantings were conducted in different patterns to determine the most successful planting technique. The technique in the foreground is a checkerboard planting, the middle area is unplanted, and the background planting was done as a continuous planting. The best success was in high density patchy plantings.Credit: NOAA Restoration Center. |  | Patchy coverage of S. alterniflora beginning to show at the test planting site on the East Timbalier marsh platform.Credit: NOAA Restoration Center. |
 | GOES image of North America. Weak band of rain on the eastern seaboard. Bright thunderstorm clouds extend along a frontal system from the Central Gulf Coast states through the Midwest to the eastern Great Lakes. Patchy rain clouds are over the Pacific Northwest whle spotty snow clouds blanket the northern Rocky Mountain states.Credit: NOAA in Space. | ||
Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |||
| Subject | Topic | Quote |
Health | Patchy areas of alveolar septal thickening and prominent hyaline membranes. (references) | |
Because their malignant cells often spread in a scattered, patchy pattern, PNETs are difficult to remove totally through surgery. (references) | ||
Even without treatment, rashes clear up on their own. In addition to rashes, second-stage symptoms can include fever, swollen lymph glands, sore throat, patchy hair loss, headaches, weight loss, muscle aches, and tiredness. (references) | ||
Economic History | Ukraine | However, the legislative framework still contains significant loopholes and enforcement of existing legislation is patchy. (references) |
Ukraine | The implementation of this program has been patchy, however. (references) | |
Australia | The Australian hardware market was patchy over the last year. (references) | |
Source: compiled by the editor from ICON Group International, Inc.; see credits. | ||
| "Patchy" is generally used as an adjective (general or positive) -- approximately 96.49% of the time. "Patchy" is used about 285 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 |
| Adjective (general or positive) | 96.49% | 275 | 17,685 |
| Noun (singular) | 3.51% | 10 | 111,207 |
| Total | 100.00% | 285 | N/A |
Source: compiled by the editor from several corpora; 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 |
patchy | 20 |
patchy hair loss | 6 |
patchy skin | 4 |
dog hair in loss patchy | 4 |
facial hair patchy | 3 |
patchy pirate | 2 |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |
| Language | Translations for "patchy"; alternative meanings/domain in parentheses. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Albanian | me hope (by fits and starts, fitful, fitfully), fragmentar (fragmentary, snatchy, snippy), copa-copa (into smithereens, snippy). (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Arabic | كشكولي, مؤلف من رقع, مرقع (botchery, patchwork), غير منتظم (irregular, unequal), غير منظم (amorphous, erratic, ragged, rough, unorganized), خليط (admixture, blend, compost, conglomeration, cut, farrago, hash, hodgepodge, hotchpotch, medley, melange, mishmash, mix, mixture, mixture concoction), شبيه بالرقع. (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Bulgarian | скърпен (haywire), разпокъсан (abrupt, scattered), неравен (bumpy, hilly, iron-bound, irregular, jolty, jumpy, knobby, lumpy, ragged, rugged, unequal, uneven), нееднакъв (dissimilar, unequal, uneven), без единство и хармония. (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Chinese | 补凑. (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Czech | slátaný, rùznorodý (heterogeneous, varied), nejednotný (disunited, divided). (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Danish | pletvis (punctated). (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Dutch | pleksgewijs. (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Farsi | وصله وصله , وصله دار, تکه تکه (Piecemeal, Scrappy), جوربجور. (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Finnish | laikullinen. (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
French | par endroits, localisé, irrégulier, instable, incomplet, inégal. (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
German | fleckig (blemished, blotched, blotchy, marked, mottled, speckled, spotted, spotty, stain, stained). (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Greek | κατά τόπους, με μπαλλώματα, εντοπισμένος, ανομοιόμορφοσ (motley). (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Hebrew | עשוי טלאים, בלתי ס"יר. (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Hungarian | foltozott, szedett-vedett. (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Italian | per zone localizzate, rattoppato, rappezzato, irregolare (anomalous, erratic, fitful, foul, irregular, ragged, rambling, uneven), chiazzato (blotched, mealy, speckled, spotted), a macchie. (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Manx | preabanagh, peeshagh, neuchorrym (disparate, disproportionate, ill-matched, inadequate, odd, unequal). (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Pig Latin | atchypay por zonas localizadas, mixórdia (hodge-podge, mash, medley, slipslop), desigual (different, discrown, disparate, hackly, incommensurate, inequable, joggly, lacerated, lopsided, one sided, ragged, rough, rugged, scratchy, shifting, snatchy, spotty, unequable, unequal, uneven), cheio de remendos. (various references) peticit (patched), neuniform (irregular, rugged), neregulat (broken, disorderly, erratic, fitful, irregular, irregularly, odd, ragged, rugged, scraggy, snatchy, unequal, uneven), bun pe alocuri. (various references) неоднородный (aliquant, heterogeneous, variegated), пятнистый (brindled, dappled, pinto, punctate, splotchy, spotted, spotty). (various references) pun zakrpa, nejednak (unequable, unequal, unlike, unmeet). (various references) por zonas localizadas, irregular de (snatchy). (various references) växlande (fluid, switching, varied), spridd (circulated, diffuse, general, scattered, straggling), ojämn (bumpy, fitful, ignorant, inequable, irregular, jagged, jaggy, joggly, odd, ragged, rough, rugged, spotty, streaky, unequal, uneven), lappad, hoplappad, flammig (flamelike, marbled), fläckvis (in spots). (various references) yamalı, derme çatma (crazy, hastily put up, jerry built, rambling, scrappy, scratch, scratchy), düzensiz (chaotic, desultory, disordered, disorderly, disorganized, erratic, excursive, fitful, freehand, haywire, hugger mugger, huggermugger, indigested, inordinate, irregular, jerky, nonuniform, non-uniform, out of order, out of square, out of trim, out-of-balance, patchily, ragged, rambling, snatchy, snuffy, unequal, unkempt, unsteady, untidy), baştan savma (evasive, patchily, perfunctory, run around, salvo, sketchy, slapdash, slipshod, slovenly). (various references) уривчастий (curt, desultory, fitful, fragmentary, jerky, scrappy, snippy), неоднорідний (catch-all, hotchpotch), плямистий (dappled, maculated, mailed, ocellated, punctate, speckled, spotted, spotty). (various references) | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Misspellings | |
"Patchy" is suggested in spellcheckers for the following: Aptech, aptychi, parchy, Parchym, Partch, Paschi, patche, pathi, pathy, pechi, petchii, piatchy, picchi, Pichi, ppatch, putch, spatch. (additional references) | |
| Source: compiled by the editor, based on several corpora (additional references). | |
| # of Phoneme Matches | Pronunciation | Word(s) rhyming with "patchy" (pronounced pa"khē) |
| 4 | p a" kh ē | Apache. |
| 3 | -a" kh ē | catchy, scratchy. |
Source: compiled by the editor (additional references); see credits. | ||
Scrabble® Enable2K-Verified Anagrams | |
| Words within the letters "a-c-h-p-t-y" | |
-1 letter: chapt, patch, yacht. | |
-2 letters: achy, caph, chap, chat, chay, pact, path, paty, phat, tach. | |
-3 letters: act, apt, cap, cat, cay, hap, hat, hay, hyp, pac, pah, pat, pay, pht, pya, tap, thy, yah, yap. | |
-4 letters: ah, at, ay, ha, pa, ta, ya. | |
| Words containing the letters "a-c-h-p-t-y" | |
+2 letters: patchily, scyphate. | |
+3 letters: archetype, champerty, heptarchy, hypocaust, lymphatic, myopathic, pachytene, patchouly, pentarchy, phagocyte, sycophant. | |
+4 letters: apothecary, archetypal, archetypes, bathyscaph, catchpenny, cytopathic, halophytic, hepatocyte, hermatypic, hyperacute, hypocausts, hypostatic, hypotactic, lymphatics, macrophyte, metaphysic, pachytenes, patriarchy, phagocytes, phagocytic, phatically, photically, phylactery, polychaete, polymathic, psychiatry, psychopath, pyracantha, sociopathy, sycophants. | |
+5 letters: amphictyony, aphetically, arthroscopy, autocephaly, bathyscaphe, bathyscaphs, cardiopathy, cartography, chamaephyte, cryotherapy, cryptarithm, cryptograph, cycadophyte, hepatectomy, hepatocytes, hydropathic, hyperactive, hyperacuity, hyperstatic, hypocentral, hypogastric, hypoplastic, hypothecate, ithyphallic, lycanthrope, lycanthropy, macrophytes, macrophytic, metaphysics, mycophagist, myelopathic, phagocytize, phagocytose, physicalist, physicality, pictography, polychaetes, psychiatric, psychopaths, psychopathy, pyracanthas, saprophytic, scyphistoma, sycophantic, sycophantly, sympathetic, trophically, typographic. | |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. SCRABBLE® is a registered trademark. All intellectual property rights in and to the game are owned in the U.S.A and Canada by Hasbro Inc., and throughout the rest of the world by J.W. Spear & Sons Limited of Maidenhead, Berkshire, England, a subsidiary of Mattel Inc. Mattel and Spear are not affiliated with Hasbro. | |
Hexadecimal (or equivalents, 770AD-1900s) (references)50 61 74 63 68 79 |
| Leonardo da Vinci (1452-1519; backwards) (references)
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| American Sign Language (origins from 1620-1817 in Italy and, especially, France) (references)
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| Semaphore (1791, in France) (references)
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| Braille (1829, in France) (references)
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Morse Code (1836) (references).--. .- - -.-. .... -.--. |
| Dancing Men (Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, 1903) (references)
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Binary Code (1918-1938, probably earlier) (references)01010000 01100001 01110100 01100011 01101000 01111001 |
HTML Code (1990) (references)P a t c h y |
ISO 10646 (1991-1993) (references)0050 0061 0074 0063 0068 0079 |
| British Sign Language (Fingerspelling, BSL; 1992, British Deaf Association Dictionary of British Sign Language) (references)
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Encryption (beginner's substitution cypher): (references)506786697491 |
| 1. Definition 2. Crosswords 3. Usage: Commercial 4. Images: Photo Album | 5. Quotations: Non-fiction 6. Usage Frequency 7. Expressions: Internet 8. Translations: Modern | 9. Derivations 10. Rhymes 11. Anagrams 12. Orthography | 13. Bibliography |
Copyright © Philip M. Parker, INSEAD. Terms of Use.
