to form letters, words, or symbols on a surface such as paper, a screen, or a board using a pen, pencil, keyboard, or other tool
She writes neatly in her notebook every morning.
I learned to write my name when I was four.
✦ Old English "writan" meaning "to scratch, draw, inscribe".
Past participle of write.
She has written three letters today.
The story was written by my grandfather.
✦ Formed from Old English ‘writen’, past participle of ‘writan’ meaning “to carve, write”.
present participle of ‘write’: putting words on paper, a screen, or another surface to communicate
I am writing a thank-you note to my teacher.
She was writing her first novel when we met.
to create and organize words to produce something such as a story, article, song, or computer program
He wants to write a novel about his travels.
The journalist wrote an article on climate change.
✦ Old English "writan" shifting from "scratch" to "compose in words" during the Middle English period.
to send someone a letter, note, postcard, or email
Don't forget to write your grandmother a thank-you letter.
She wrote to me last week with the good news.
✦ Use of "write" meaning "communicate by letter" dates from the 12th century.
(computing) to record data onto a file, disk, memory chip, or other storage medium
The program writes the results to a log file every hour.
Make sure you write the changes to disk before shutting down.
✦ Technical sense developed in the mid-20th century with magnetic storage devices.
a machine or computer program that records data onto a storage medium such as a CD, DVD, or hard drive
I bought an external DVD writer to back up my photos.
The software’s built-in ISO writer lets you create bootable flash drives easily.
✦ Extended from the original sense of “writer” as one that writes, applied metaphorically to machines and programs that record data.
