a person who writes computer programs or creates software applications
After graduating, Maria became a developer at a video-game studio.
The small start-up hired three more developers to speed up the app release.
✦ From develop + –er, first applied to software creators in the mid-20th century.
a person or company that buys land and builds houses, stores, or offices to sell or rent
The developer plans to build a shopping mall on the empty lot.
Local residents protested the developer's plan to cut down the old trees.
✦ Develop in the sense of "convert land to profitable use" + –er, first recorded late 19th century in the United States.
a chemical liquid used in photography to make the hidden image on film or photographic paper appear
She poured the exposed film into a tank filled with developer.
Always wear gloves when handling developer in the darkroom.
✦ Sense originates from the 19th-century photographic process, in which the solution ‘develops’ the latent image.
