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cursor

UK/ˈkɜːsə/US/ˈkɜɹsəɹ/
nounB1+Rare in speech; mostly a word you read · #14,377 of 15,258leans written

Other forms: cursors

The cursor is the little arrow or blinking line that shows where you are on screen. Move the cursor, the cursor blinks, place the cursor there.

There are two: the pointer that follows the mouse and the text cursor, called the caret, that marks where typing will go. The Latin means a runner, which is what the word first named on a slide rule.

Cuculuc · CC0

Definitions of cursor

  1. 1nouncursorThe little arrow or blinking line that shows where you are on screen.B1+

    “Move the cursor to the top of the page and click on the menu.”

cursor is a marker.

Also accepted in games: pointer

Where it comes from

Latin cursor means a runner, from currere, to run; it first named the sliding part of a slide rule.

  1. Proto-Indo-European

    *ḱers-

  2. Latin

    cursor — runner

  3. English, today

    cursor

Built from

  • currō · Latin — run

Borrowed from Latin cursor (“runner”), from currō (“run”) + -or. Ultimately from Proto-Indo-European -.

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA

Practised in Technology & Internet

Practise this word

cursor in the wild

  • ANSI escape sequences are a standard for in-band signaling to control cursor location, color, font styling, and other options on video text terminals and terminal emulators.

    ANSI escape code

  • ANSI codes can change the color of text and move the cursor so text can be drawn anywhere on the screen.

    ANSI escape code

  • The terminal only supports forward scrolling and direct cursor addressing; no fancier editing functions are supported.

    VT05

  • In a command-line interface (CLI), text box, or word processor, they typically enable caret navigation, allowing the user to move the text cursor between characters and lines.

    Arrow keys

  • The cursor keys predated the mouse pointer and were the primary means of cursor movement in the CLIs of the early 1980s.

    Arrow keys

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From Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0. These sentences were written by other people about their own subjects; they are here to show the word at work, not as anybody’s opinion.

Related words

the currō family

course

cursor — used about once every 54,060 pages · #14,377 · point at the bar for the others

  • cursory