Log

How to spell log

3 letters · 1 syllable

How to pronounce log

What does log mean?

1. nounA bulky, unshaped piece of a tree trunk or thick branch, often used as firewood.
2. nounA continuous written or electronic record of events, activity, or measurements.
3. verbTo record an event, figure, or piece of information in a systematic way.

Log in a sentence

• noun

  He threw another log onto the fire to keep the room warm.

• noun

  The captain updated the ship's log at the end of each watch.

• verb

  Please log every customer complaint in the shared spreadsheet.

• noun

  A fallen log blocked the path through the woods.

• noun

  The server keeps a detailed log of every login attempt.

• verb

  Drivers must log their hours to comply with the regulations.

Where does log come from?

Language of origin: Old Norse

The word log first appears in English in the 1300s with the plain meaning of a bulky, unshaped piece of timber, especially part of a felled tree trunk. Its exact origin is uncertain, but it is widely thought to be of Scandinavian descent, comparable to Old Norse lag and dialectal Norwegian laag, meaning a felled tree or fallen trunk. The familiar sense of a written record grew out of seafaring: sailors measured a ship's speed by trailing a weighted wooden log on a knotted line, and the figures they noted down were collected in a logbook, so log came to mean the running record itself. From ships the idea spread to aircraft, machines, and eventually computers, where to log in means to record your arrival in the system. The much later mathematical sense, short for logarithm, is unrelated in origin, coming from the Greek logos meaning ratio or reckoning and arithmos meaning number.

How the word is built

• log (single root: a bulky piece of wood; no prefix or suffix)