COMPACTNESS

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

IPA (US):

 Dictionary entry overview: What does compactness mean? 

• COMPACTNESS (noun)
  The noun COMPACTNESS has 2 senses:

1. the spatial property of being crowded together

2. the consistency of a compact solid

  Familiarity information: COMPACTNESS used as a noun is rare.

 Dictionary entry details 

• COMPACTNESS (noun)

Sense 1

Meaning:

The spatial property of being crowded together

Classified under:

Nouns denoting attributes of people and objects

Synonyms:

compactness; concentration; denseness; density; tightness

Hypernyms ("compactness" is a kind of...):

spacing; spatial arrangement (the property possessed by an array of things that have space between them)

Sense 2

Meaning:

The consistency of a compact solid

Classified under:

Nouns denoting attributes of people and objects

Hypernyms ("compactness" is a kind of...):

solidity; solidness (the consistency of a solid)

Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "compactness"):

denseness; density (the amount per unit size)

Derivation:

compact (having a short and solid form or stature)

 Context examples 

A measure of the compactness of a substance, expressed as its mass per unit volume.

(Mass Density, NCI Thesaurus)

What was to be particularly admired (he said) in the Commons, was its compactness.

(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)

It is not a scrambling collection of low single rooms, with as many roofs as windows; it is not cramped into the vulgar compactness of a square farmhouse: it is a solid, roomy, mansion-like looking house, such as one might suppose a respectable old country family had lived in from generation to generation, through two centuries at least, and were now spending from two to three thousand a year in.

(Mansfield Park, by Jane Austen)