TANGENT • FREE TRANSLATOR.ORG • Definition of Tangent

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/tˈændʒənt/ Listen

Tangent

noun

A straight line or plane that touches a curve or curved surface at a point but does not intersect it at that point.

Ratio of the opposite to the adjacent side of a right-angled triangle. Synonym: tan.

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"Tangent" Quotes from Famous Books

... one first-class scare when the train drew up in the squalid station, where the branch line to Haifa meets the main Hedjaz railway and the two together touch a mean town at a tangent; for a French officer in uniform boarded the train and stalked down the corridors staring hard at everyone. He asked me for a passport, which was sheer bluff, so I asked him in turn for his own authority. He smiled and produced a rubber stamp, saying that ...

— Affair in Araby • Talbot Mundy

... a tangent, leaving Jeffreys, cool in body and mind, to await his return. To an ordinarily excitable person, the position was a critical one. The water was numbing; the ice at the edge of the hole was rotten, and broke away ...

— A Dog with a Bad Name • Talbot Baines Reed

... getting Miriam, lead-dog to Frona's team, to take the trail left by him and the baron. The dog went on bravely, scrambling over, floundering through, and sometimes swimming; but when she had gained the farthest point reached by them, she sat down helplessly. Later on, she cut back to the shore at a tangent, landing on the deserted island above; and an hour afterwards trotted into camp minus the grub-pack. Then the two dogs, hovering just out of range, compromised matters by devouring each other's burdens; after which the attempt was given over and ...

— A Daughter of the Snows • Jack London

... some in complicated watches of 12 teeth, and in old English watches, of 30, which is a clumsy arrangement, and if the pallets embrace only three teeth in the latter, the pallet center cannot be pitched on a tangent. ...

— An Analysis of the Lever Escapement • H. R. Playtner

... least it meant that there would be no loose rubble on the surface. It would have been tossed off long ago by the centrifugal force, flying off on a tangent to become more of the tiny rubble of the belt. Perhaps "flying" wasn't exactly the right word, though, when applied to a velocity of less than one centimeter per second. ...

— Anchorite • Randall Garrett

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