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Webster 1913 Edition


Migrate

Mi′grate

,
Verb.
I.
[
imp. & p. p.
Migrated
;
p. pr. & vb. n.
Migrating
.]
[L.
migratus
, p. p. of
migrare
to migrate, transfer.]
1.
To remove from one country or region to another, with a view to residence; to change one’s place of residence; to remove;
as, the Moors who
migrated
from Africa into Spain; to
migrate
to the West.
2.
To pass periodically from one region or climate to another for feeding or breeding; – said of certain birds, fishes, and quadrupeds.

Webster 1828 Edition


Migrate

MI'GRATE

,
Verb.
I.
[L. migro.] To pass or remove from one country or from one state to another, with a view to permanent residence, or residence of some continuance. The first settlers of New England migrated first to Holland, and afterwards to America. Some species of fowls migrate in autumn to a warmer climate for a temporary residence. To change residence in the same city or state is not to migrate.
1.
To pass or remove from one region or district to another for a temporary residence; as, the Tartars migrate for the sake of finding pasturage.

Definition 2024


migrate

migrate

English

Verb

migrate (third-person singular simple present migrates, present participle migrating, simple past and past participle migrated)

  1. (intransitive) To relocate periodically from one region to another, usually according to the seasons.
    • Twice a year the geese migrate — from Florida to Canada and back again.
    • Twice a year the Minnesotans migrate from their state to the Gulf of Mexico.
  2. (intransitive) To change one's geographic pattern of habitation.
    Many groups had migrated to western Europe from the plains of eastern Europe.
  3. (intransitive) To change habitations across a border; to move from one country or political region to another.
    • To escape persecution, they migrated to a neutral country.
  4. (intransitive) To move slowly towards, usually in groups.
    • Once the hosts started bickering in the kitchens, the guests began to migrate towards the living room.
  5. (transitive, computing): To move computer code or files from one computer or network to another.
    • They had finished migrating all of the affected code to the production server by 2:00am, three hours later than expected.
  6. (transitive, marketing) To induce customers to shift purchases from one set of a company's related products to another.
    We were hoping to migrate the customers of the "C" series to the "E" series and the "E" customers to the "S" series.

Usage notes

Some people consider the jargonistic transitive form of this word to be improper, on the grounds that it is untraditional, and that if a transitive verb is to be constructed from migrate it should still be the subject that is doing the migrating. Alternatives include move, herd, transfer, or relocate. This objection is not widespread however, and migrate is the only term generally used to mean specifically the movement of computer code from one computer to another. Usually both computers are servers of some sort.

Derived terms

Related terms

Translations

Anagrams


Italian

Verb

migrate

  1. second-person plural present indicative of migrare
  2. second-person plural imperative of migrare
  3. feminine plural of migrato

Anagrams


Latin

Verb

migrāte

  1. second-person plural present imperative of migrō

Participle

migrāte

  1. vocative masculine singular of migrātus