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profile

From Wiktionary, the free dictionary
See also: Profile and profilé

English

profile view of a head (2)

Etymology

From French profil, from Italian profilo (“a border”), later also proffilo (“a side-face, profile”), from Latin pro (“before”) + filo (“a line, stroke, thread”), from filum (“a thread”); see file. Doublet of purfle.

Pronunciation

Noun

profile (countable and uncountable, plural profiles)

  1. (countable) The outermost shape, view, or edge of an object.
    Synonym: contour
    His fingers traced the profile of the handle.
  2. (countable) The shape, view, or shadow of a person's head from the side; a side view.
    The brooch showed the profile of a Victorian woman.
    Driver's licenses have a photograph of the person on them, which is in full face if the person is above legal drinking age, or in profile if not.
  3. (countable) A summary or collection of information, especially about a person.
    Law enforcement assembled a profile of the suspect.
  4. (Internet, countable) A specific page or field in which users can provide various types of personal information in software or Internet systems.
    I just updated my Facebook profile to show I got engaged.
    • 2018, Tommy Orange, “Edwin Black”, in There There, New York, N.Y.: Vintage Books, →ISBN, page 69:
      After getting permisssion from my mom, I personal messaged ten different Harveys from her profile who seemed “obviously” Native and lived in Phoenix.
  5. (figurative, uncountable) Reputation, prominence; noticeability.
    Acting is, by nature, profession in which one must keep a high profile.
  6. (uncountable) The amount by which something protrudes.
    Choose a handle with a low profile so it does not catch on things.
  7. (archaeology) A smoothed (e.g., troweled or brushed) vertical surface of an excavation showing evidence of at least one feature or diagnostic specimen; the graphic recording of such as by sketching, photographing, etc.
  8. Character; totality of related characteristics; signature; status (especially in scientific, technical, or military uses).
    What's the thermal profile on that thing?
  9. (architecture) A section of any member, made at right angles with its main lines, showing the exact shape of mouldings etc.
  10. (civil engineering) A drawing exhibiting a vertical section of the ground along a surveyed line, or graded work, as of a railway, showing elevations, depressions, grades, etc.
  11. (military slang) An exemption from certain types of duties due to injury or disability.
  12. (computing, countable) A user's preferences.
    A roaming profile allows your settings to follow you from one computer to another across a network.

Derived terms

Translations

Verb

profile (third-person singular simple present profiles, present participle profiling, simple past and past participle profiled)

  1. (transitive) To create a summary or collection of information about (a person, etc.).
    • 1984 April 7, Warren Blumenfeld, “Boston's Other Voice”, in Gay Community News, page 11:
      The book The Men with the Pink Triangles, profiling the lives of gay prisoners in the German concentration camp.
    • 2018, Clarence Green, James Lambert, “Advancing disciplinary literacy through English for academic purposes: Discipline-specific wordlists, collocations and word families for eight secondary subjects”, in Journal of English for Academic Purposes, volume 35, →DOI, page 106:
      A resource that profiles the important language of secondary disciplines by adapting the methods of EAP research could therefore be very useful for such pedagogy.
    • 2026 July 16, Nicholas Muhoro, “Inside the 2004 Brianna Maitland Case: One of Vermont’s Most Haunting Mysteries”, in Skip Boring‎[2], archived from the original on 21 July 2026:
      Brianna was profiled as a teen with an unstable living situation and a habit of moving between houses.
  2. To act based on such a summary, especially one that is a stereotype; to engage in profiling.
  3. (transitive) To draw in profile or outline.
  4. (transitive, engineering) To give a definite form by chiselling, milling, etc.
  5. (computing, transitive) To measure the performance of various parts of (a program) so as to locate bottlenecks.
    • 2006, Dr. Dobb's Journal:
      […] a complete and intuitive profiler that supports numerous types of profiling modes and profilable applications.

Derived terms

Translations

References

  1. ^ James A. H. Murray et al., editors (1884–1928), “Profile, n.”, in A New English Dictionary on Historical Principles (Oxford English Dictionary), volume VII (O–P), London: Clarendon Press, →OCLC, page 1431, column 2.
  2. ^ Thorson, Per (1951), “English Long Vowels Rendering Foreign Short. A Distinctive Class of Sound Substitutions”, in The Journal of English and Germanic Philology‎[1], volume 50, number 1, University of Illinois Press, →ISSN, →OCLC, page 68.
  3. ^ Walker, John (1791), “Profile”, in A Critical Pronouncing Dictionary […] , London: G. G. J. and J. Robinſon […] and T. Cadell, →OCLC, page 408, column 3 of 3.

Further reading

Anagrams

French

Pronunciation

Verb

profile

  1. inflection of profiler:
    1. first/third-person singular present indicative/subjunctive
    2. second-person singular imperative
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