CIPHER

Cipher

In cryptography, a cipher is an algorithm for performing encryption or decryption—a series of well-defined steps that can be followed as a procedure. An alternative, less common term is encipherment. To encipher or encode is to convert information from plain text into cipher or code. In non-technical usage, a 'cipher' is the same thing as a 'code'; however, the concepts are distinct in cryptography. In classical cryptography, ciphers were distinguished from codes.

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cipher

Noun

  1. A numeric character.
  2. Any text character.
  3. A combination or interweaving of letters, as the initials of a name; a device; a monogram.
    a painter's cipher, an engraver's cipher, etc.
  4. A method of transforming a text in order to conceal its meaning.
    The message was written in a simple cipher. Anyone could figure it out.
  5. A cryptographic system using an algorithm that converts letters or sequences of bits into ciphertext.
  6. Ciphertext; a message concealed via a cipher.
    The message is clearly a cipher, but I can't figure it out.
  7. A grouping of three digits in a number, especially when delimited by commas or periods:
    The probability is 1 in 1,000,000,000,000,000 — a number having five ciphers of zeros.
  8. A design of interlacing initials: a decorative design consisting of a set of interlaced initials.
  9. A fault in an organ valve which causes a pipe to sound continuously without the key having been pressed.
  10. A hip-hop jam session 1
  11. The path (usually circular) shared cannabis takes through a group, an occasion of cannabis smoking.
  12. Someone or something of no importance.
  13. Zero.

Verb

  1. To calculate.
    I never learned much more than how to read and cipher.


The above text is a snippet from Wiktionary: cipher
and as such is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

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