paste
    n 1: any mixture of a soft and malleable consistency
    2: a hard, brilliant lead glass that is used in making
       artificial jewelry
    3: an adhesive made from water and flour or starch; used on
       paper and paperboard [syn: paste, library paste]
    4: a tasty mixture to be spread on bread or crackers or used in
       preparing other dishes [syn: spread, paste]
    v 1: join or attach with or as if with glue; "paste the sign on
         the wall"; "cut and paste the sentence in the text" [syn:
         glue, paste]
    2: hit with the fists; "He pasted his opponent"
    3: cover the surface of; "paste the wall with burlap"

Paste \Paste\, v. t. [imp. & p. p. Pasted; p. pr. & vb. n.
   Pasting.]
   To unite with paste; to fasten or join by means of paste.
   [1913 Webster]

Paste \Paste\ (p[=a]st), n. [OF. paste, F. p[^a]te, L. pasta,
   fr. Gr. ? barley broth; cf. ? barley porridge, ? sprinkled
   with salt, ? to sprinkle. Cf. Pasty, n., Patty.]
   1. A soft composition, as of flour moistened with water or
      milk, or of earth moistened to the consistence of dough,
      as in making potter's ware.
      [1913 Webster]

   2. Specifically, in cookery, a dough prepared for the crust
      of pies and the like; pastry dough.
      [1913 Webster]

   3. A kind of cement made of flour and water, starch and
      water, or the like, -- used for uniting paper or other
      substances, as in bookbinding, etc., -- also used in
      calico printing as a vehicle for mordant or color.
      [1913 Webster]

   4. A highly refractive vitreous composition, variously
      colored, used in making imitations of precious stones or
      gems. See Strass.
      [1913 Webster]

   5. A soft confection made of the inspissated juice of fruit,
      licorice, or the like, with sugar, etc.
      [1913 Webster]

   6. (Min.) The mineral substance in which other minerals are
      imbedded.
      [1913 Webster]

   Paste eel (Zool.), the vinegar eel. See under Vinegar.
      [1913 Webster]

copy and paste
cut and paste
paste

    (Or "cut and paste", after the paper, scissors and glue
   method of document production) The system supported by most
   document editing applications (e.g. text editors) and most
   operating systems that allows you to select a part of the
   document and then save it in a temporary buffer (known
   variously as the "clipboard", "cut buffer", "kill ring").  A
   "copy" leaves the document unchanged whereas a "cut" deletes
   the selected part.

   A "paste" inserts the data from the clipboard at the current
   position in the document (usually replacing any currently
   selected data).  This may be done more than once, in more than
   one position and in different documents.

   More sophisticated operating systems support copy and paste
   of different data types between different applications,
   possibly with automatic format conversion, e.g from rich
   text to plain ASCII.

   GNU Emacs uses the terms "kill" instead of "cut" and "yank"
   instead of "paste" and data is stored in the "kill ring".

   [Origin?  Macintosh?  Xerox?]

   (1998-07-01)