ding

plural dings

1. informalVery minor damage caused by being struck; a small dent or chip.

   Mike hit the bottom and picked up a little ding on his head.

   1966, Bruce Brown, director, The Endless Summer

   1 more example

   If you surf regularly, then you're going to ding your board. Here's a rough guide on how to repair them... If the ding is on the rail, run tape across the ding conforming to the rail curve, leaving a gap to pour in resin and make sure it is sealed to prevent resin escaping and forming dribbles.

   2007 September, “Ding Repairs”, BBC Wales, archived on 5 October 2014

2. colloquialA rejection.

   I just got my first ding letter.

present singular third person dings · participle present dinging · past dinged · obsolete past dang · participle past dinged · obsolete participle past dang · obsolete participle past dung

1. transitiveTo hit or strike.
2. To dash; to throw violently.

   to ding the book a coit's distance from him

   1644, John Milton, Areopagitica; a Speech of Mr. John Milton for the Liberty of Unlicenc’d Printing, to the Parlament of England, London: [s.n.], →OCLC

   1 more example

   The butcher's axe (like great Alcides' bat) / Dings deadly downe ten thousand thousand flat.

   1630, Taylor's Works

3. colloquialtransitiveTo inflict minor damage upon, especially by hitting or striking.

   If you surf regularly, then you're going to ding your board.

   2007 September, “Ding Repairs”, BBC Wales, archived on 5 October 2014

4. colloquialtransitiveTo fire or reject.

   His top school dinged him last week.

5. colloquialtransitiveTo deduct, as points, from (somebody), in the manner of a penalty; to penalize.

   My bank dinged me three bucks for using their competitor's ATM.

   1 more example

   […] [E]mployees don't feel like they're going to get dinged on performance reviews because they had the same goals as a guy who had been there all 12 months with no leave.

   2015 August 7, Ron Lieber, “Bringing paternity leave into the mainstream [print version: Paid leave expands for fathers, but will there be any takers?, International New York Times, 10 August 2015, p. 14]”, in The New York Times

6. transitivegolfTo mishit (a golf ball).
7. ScotlandTo fall heavily and continually, with great force.

   It's dingin' on, isn't?

   1876, Alec Forbes, MacDonald, page 193

   2 more examples

   The night turn'd dark an' dang on rain, […]

   1821, William Liddle (of Edinburgh.), Poems on different occasions, chiefly in the Scottish dialect, page 226

   An awfu' show'r o' sna' and drift / As ever dang down frae the lift; / Right wild an' monstrous Boreas roar'd.

   1832, John Burness, Thrummy Cap, a Tale [in Verse]; and The Brownie O' Fearnden, a Ballad, page 4

plural dings

1. The high-pitched resonant sound of a bell.
2. colloquialespeciallyroleplaying gamesvideo gamesThe act of levelling up.

present singular third person dings · participle present dinging · participle past dinged · past dinged

1. intransitiveTo make a high-pitched resonant sound like a bell.

   The fretful tinkling of the convent bell evermore dinging among the mountain echoes.

   1824, Geoffrey Crayon [pseudonym; Washington Irving], Tales of a Traveller, (please specify |part=1 to 4), Philadelphia, Pa.: H[enry] C[harles] Carey & I[saac] Lea, […], →OCLC

   1 more example

   These were succeeded by anchor and chain-cable forges, where sledgehammers were dinging upon iron all day long.

   1846 October 1 – 1848 April 1, Charles Dickens, Dombey and Son, London: Bradbury and Evans, […], published 1848, →OCLC

2. transitiveTo keep repeating; impress by reiteration, with reference to the monotonous striking of a bell.

   If I'm to have any good, let it come of itself; not keep dinging it, dinging it into one so.

   1884, Oswald Crawfurd, English comic dramatists

3. colloquialespeciallyintransitiveroleplaying gamesvideo gamesTo level up.

plural dings · alternative ting

1. An ancient Chinese vessel with legs and a lid.

plural dings

1. Hong KongAn indigenous inhabitant of the New Territories entitled to the building a village house under the Small House Policy.

plural dings

1. AustraliaWesternethnicoffensivesluran Italian person, specifically an Italian Australian

1. uncountableIn American Chinese cuisine, cubed or bite-sized meat.

   shrimp ding

   1 more example

   chicken ding

1. historicalA prefecture of imperial China within present-day Hebei under the Northern Wei, Sui, and Tang dynasties, with its seat at Dingzhou.
2. historicalA county of Republican China in Hebei Province.

   Synonyms: Dingxian

alternative Ting

1. A surname from Mandarin or Eastern Min.