gremlin

«gremlin» in Mova's school dictionary: An imaginary, mischievous little creature blamed for… — its meaning for a pupil, its sense in the lessons and examples.

part of speech

noun (a gremlin, gremlins)

meaning for a pupil

1) An imaginary, mischievous little creature blamed for things going wrong with machines. tree →

2) (informal) An unknown small fault that makes a machine or computer break down: there's a gremlin in the system. tree →

sense in the lessons

In stories and films (like «Gremlins») gremlins are naughty creatures. In everyday life adults joke that «gremlins» broke the printer or the Wi-Fi. The idea started with pilots in the Royal Air Force in the 1920s–1940s, blaming plane faults on gremlins. Phrases: a gremlin in the works, technical gremlins.

examples

• Dad blamed the gremlins when the computer crashed. tree →
• There's a gremlin in the printer again. tree →
• In the story, a green gremlin hid inside the plane. tree →
• Technical gremlins delayed the school play's lights. tree →
• Pilots used to joke that gremlins chewed the wires. tree →
• The engineers hunted the gremlin for hours. tree →

note

Countable: a gremlin, gremlins. Gremlins are not real; «a gremlin» in machines is a way of saying «an unknown fault». Not the same as goblins, though both are small mischievous creatures in stories.

Trees and pragmatics

Every meaning and example of «gremlin» parsed by Mova, each sentence with its dependency tree and frames.