Third person singular present tense of delete; removes or erases data, text, or files from a computer system. Can also mean to remove something from existence.
From Latin 'deletus', past participle of 'delere' meaning 'to destroy, blot out, efface'. Entered English in the 17th century but gained prominence with computing in the 20th century.
The concept of 'deletion' in computing is fascinatingly complex—when you delete a file, it's often not actually erased but simply marked as available space until overwritten. This digital archaeological layer has created entire fields of data recovery and forensic investigation.
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