Word
alice
Phoneticsal·ice
/ˈæɫəs/
Definitions
01female name
n. a popular female given name.
n. a female given name of Germanic origin, common in English-speaking cultures since the Middle Ages.
“Alice decided to go for a walk in the park after finishing her book.”
“The protagonist, Alice, navigates a series of increasingly surreal encounters throughout the narrative.”
02cryptography/physics
n. a name used in science for the first person sending a message to a second person, usually called Bob.
n. a conventional placeholder name for the first party in a communication protocol, typically paired with 'Bob' as the receiver.
“In this example, Alice sends an encrypted email to Bob using his public key.”
“The thought experiment assumes that Alice and Bob share an entangled pair of particles before being separated by a significant distance.”
Technical
Usage
Usually used without an article as a proper noun in technical diagrams and explanations.
03Alice Springs
n. a common nickname for the city of Alice Springs in Australia.
n. a colloquial toponym for the town of Alice Springs in the Northern Territory of Australia.
“We spent three days in the Alice before driving out to see Uluru.”
“Many travellers use the Alice as a base of operations for exploring the remote regions of the Australian Outback.”
Informal · Dialect
Usage
Usually used with the definite article: 'the Alice'.
Etymology
From Middle English Alice, from Old French Alys, Alice, from Old High German Adalheid, proposed to derive from Proto-Germanic aþalaz (“noble”) + haiduz (“character”). Doublet of Adelaide.
Etymology adapted from Wiktionary, available under CC BY-SA 4.0.
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englishreference.com/q/alice