decode

To convert from an encrypted form to plain text.

Noun

  1. A product of decoding
    • If and when the remaining Allied intercepts and decodes are opened up, we may expect to learn a great deal more about the later stages of the Holocaust. - 2004, David Cesarani, Holocaust: Responses to the Persecution...
    • The British picked up a decode in November 1942 indicating that guards at Auschwitz would need six hundred gas masks. - 2005, Richard Breitman, U.S. Intelligence And The Nazis, page 31:
    • Decodes stating that Hollandia airfields were becoming overcrowded with IJA aircraft waiting to stage forward to Wewak led to pre-emptive strikes by Allied air forces and the destruction of more than 300 Japanese...
  2. Output from a program or device used to interpret communication protocols
    • This version includes more than 400 decodes that cover everything from legacy decodes to popular decodes and new or updated decodes for such protocols as voice over IP H.323, Server Message Block, Border Gateway...

Origin

Etymology tree Proto-Indo-European *de Proto-Indo-European *-h₁ Proto-Indo-European *déh₁ Proto-Italic *dē Latin dē Latin dē-der. English de- English code English decode From de- + code.

Forms

decodes

Verb

  1. To convert from an encrypted form to plain text.
    • The cryptographer decoded the secret message and sent the result to the officer.

    Synonyms: decipher decrypt uncode

    Antonyms: encode encrypt

  2. To figure out something difficult to interpret.
    • I finally managed to decode the nearly illegible doctor's prescription.

Forms

decodes decoding decoded

Derived

codec decodability decodable decoder misdecode nondecoded redecode undecoded