English

maintenance

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Meaning
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  1. (uncountable, usually) Actions performed to keep some machine or system functioning or in service.
  2. (uncountable, usually) A tort and (in some jurisdictions) an offence committed when a third party who does not have a bona fide interest in a lawsuit provides help or acquires an interest to a litigant's lawsuit.
  3. (UK, uncountable, usually) Alimony, a periodical payment or a lump sum made or ordered to be made to a spouse after a divorce.
  4. (uncountable, usually) Child support.
  5. (uncountable, usually) Money required or spent to provide for the needs of a person or a family.
  6. (uncountable, usually) The natural process which keeps an organism alive.
  7. (Philippines, abbreviation, alt-of, colloquial, ellipsis, uncountable, usually) Ellipsis of maintenance medicine.
  8. (attributive, uncountable, usually) Software updates that fix bugs and improve stability rather than adding new features.

Frequency

C1
Pronounced as (IPA)
/ˈmeɪnt(ə)nəns/
Etymology

Inherited from Middle English
mayntenaunce
In summary

From Middle English mayntenaunce, from Old French maintenance, from maintenir, from Latin manus tenēre (“to hold in the hand”). By surface analysis, maintain + -ance. Note that maintain has undergone a sound and spelling change, hence is spelt with -tain-, rather than the -ten- still found in maintenance.

Related words
installation construction
🚧
infrastructure implementation responsibilities administration

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