From WordNet (r) 3.0 (2006) [wn]:
coast
n 1: the shore of a sea or ocean [syn: seashore, coast,
seacoast, sea-coast]
2: a slope down which sleds may coast; "when it snowed they made
a coast on the golf course"
3: the area within view; "the coast is clear"
4: the act of moving smoothly along a surface while remaining in
contact with it; "his slide didn't stop until the bottom of
the hill"; "the children lined up for a coast down the snowy
slope" [syn: slide, glide, coast]
v 1: move effortlessly; by force of gravity
From The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48 [gcide]:
Coast \Coast\ (k[=o]st), n. [OF. coste, F. c[^o]te, rib, hill,
shore, coast, L. costa rib, side. Cf. Accost, v. t.,
Cutlet.]
1. The side of a thing. [Obs.] --Sir I. Newton.
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2. The exterior line, limit, or border of a country; frontier
border. [Obs.]
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From the river, the river Euphrates, even to the
uttermost sea, shall your coast be. --Deut. xi.
24.
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3. The seashore, or land near it.
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He sees in English ships the Holland coast.
--Dryden.
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We the Arabian coast do know
At distance, when the species blow. --Waller.
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The coast is clear, the danger is over; no enemy in sight.
--Dryden. Fig.: There are no obstacles. "Seeing that the
coast was clear, Zelmane dismissed Musidorus." --Sir P.
Sidney.
Coast guard.
(a) A body of men originally employed along the coast to
prevent smuggling; now, under the control of the
admiralty, drilled as a naval reserve. [Eng.]
(b) The force employed in life-saving stations along the
seacoast. [U. S.]
Coast rat (Zool.), a South African mammal ({Bathyergus
suillus}), about the size of a rabbit, remarkable for its
extensive burrows; -- called also sand mole.
Coast waiter, a customhouse officer who superintends the
landing or shipping of goods for the coast trade. [Eng.]
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From The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48 [gcide]:
Coast \Coast\ (k[=o]st), v. i. [imp. & p. p. Coasted; p. pr. &
vb. n. Coasting.] [OE. costien, costeien, costen, OF.
costier, costoier, F. c[^o]toyer, fr. Of. coste coast, F.
c[^o]te. See Coast, n.]
1. To draw or keep near; to approach. [Obs.]
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Anon she hears them chant it lustily,
And all in haste she coasteth to the cry. --Shak.
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2. To sail by or near the shore.
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The ancients coasted only in their navigation.
--Arbuthnot.
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3. To sail from port to port in the same country.
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4. [Cf. OF. coste, F. c[^o]te, hill, hillside.] To slide down
hill; to slide on a sled, upon snow or ice. [Local, U. S.]
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From The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48 [gcide]:
Coast \Coast\, v. t.
1. To draw near to; to approach; to keep near, or by the side
of. [Obs.] --Hakluyt.
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2. To sail by or near; to follow the coast line of.
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Nearchus, . . . not knowing the compass, was fain to
coast that shore. --Sir T.
Browne.
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3. To conduct along a coast or river bank. [Obs.]
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The Indians . . . coasted me along the river.
--Hakluyt.
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From The Free On-line Dictionary of Computing (8 July 2008) [foldoc]:
Cache On A STick
COAST
<architecture> (COAST) Intel Corporation attempt to's
standardise the modular L2 cache subsystem in
Pentium-based computers.
A COAST module should be about 4.35" wide by 1.14" high.
According to earlier specifications from Motorola, a module
between 4.33" and 4.36" wide, and between 1.12" and 1.16" high
is within the COAST standard. Some module vendors, including
some major motherboard suppliers, greatly violate the height
specification.
Another COAST specification violated by many suppliers
concerns clock distribution in synchronous modules. The
specification requires that the clock tree to each synchronous
chip be balanced, i.e. equal length from edge of the connector
to individual chips. An unbalanced clock tree increases
reflections and noise.
For a 256 kilobyte cache module the standard requires the
same clock be used for both chips but some vendors use
separate clocks to reduce loading on the clock driver and
hence increase the clock speed. However, this creates
unbalanced loading in other motherboard configurations, such
as motherboards with soldered caches in the system.
(1996-06-10)