I. ˈkā noun
( plural k's or ks ˈkāz)
Usage: often capitalized, often attributive
1.
a. : the 11th letter of the English alphabet
b. : an instance of this letter printed, written, or otherwise represented
c. : a speech counterpart of orthographic k (as k in kill, skill, like, joked, or German kühn )
2. : a printer's type, a stamp, or some other instrument for reproducing the letter k
3. : someone or something arbitrarily or conveniently designated k especially as the 10th or when j is used for the 10th the 11th in order or class
4. : something having the shape of the letter K
5. : a unit vector parallel to the z-axis
II. abbreviation
Usage: often capitalized
1.
[Latin kalendae ]
calends
2. karat
3.
[ kathode ]
cathode
4. keel
5. keg
6. Kelvin
7. key
8. kilo-
9. kilogram
10. king
11. kip
12. kitchen
13. knight
14. knit
15. knot
16. kopeck
17. koruna
18. kran
19. krona
20. krone
21. kroon
22. kurus
III. symbol
1. capitalized
[New Latin kalium ]
potassium
2. often capitalized constant
3.
[German konstant ]
Boltzman's constant
4. thermal conductivity
5.
a. key — used as a cryptographic subscript
B p (D k ) . E c means that D was used as the key letter when B was enciphered into E
— see vigene re cipher
b. capitalized a cryptographic numerical keying element or the numerical value of a key letter when the normal alphabet is numbered from 0 to 25
P + C . K is the Beaufort keying method
6. capitalized : dissociation constant
7. capitalized : ionization constant
IV. noun
Etymology: kilo-
1. : thousand
a salary of $24 K
2.
[from the fact that 1024 (2 10 ) is the power of 2 closest to 1000]
: a unit of computer storage capacity equal to 1024 bytes
uses 120K of disk space
V. ˈkā abbreviation or noun
( -s )
Usage: usually capitalized
Etymology: struc k
: strikeout
VI. abbreviation
1. kilometer
2. kindergarten