postfix

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English

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Etymology

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From post- +‎ fix.

Pronunciation

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Verb

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postfix (third-person singular simple present postfixes, present participle postfixing, simple past and past participle postfixed)

  1. (transitive) To suffix.
    • 1762, John Parkhurst, An Hebrew and English Lexicon: Without Points:
      Verbs with י for the first radical, often drop it in the future, imperative, and infinitive of Kal, to which last they postfix ת (לקח to take, follows this form), and in Niph. and Hiph. they change י into ו.
  2. (biology) To subject a sample to postfixation

Noun

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postfix (plural postfixes)

  1. (chiefly computing) Suffix.
    • 1843, George Moody, The English journal of education[1], volume 1, page 69:
      Two, or three at the very most, of the prefixes or postfixes are quite sufficient for one day's lesson.
    • 2006, Patrick Blackburn · Johan Bos · Kristina Striegnitz, Learn Prolog Now!, §9.4
      An example of a postfix operator is the ++ notation used in the C programming language to increment the value of a variable.
  2. (linguistics, Czech) a suffix that goes after the ending

Usage notes

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Postfix is often used in programming or computing, while in the modern era suffix is used elsewhere, especially in linguistics.

Derived terms

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See also

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