tinkerings

Question

0Hello, can anyone tell me what "tinkerings" means? I could not find it in the dictionary... :-( The context is an article titled "The Tinkerings of Robert Noyce: How the Sun Rose in Silicon Valley". I guess it has something to do with the following paragraph:02br02br00Just why was it that small-town boys from the Middle West dominated the engineering frontiers? Noyce concluded it was because in a small town you became a technician, 01b00a tinker02b00, an engineer, and an and inventor, by necessity.02br02br00Thanks!0-

Nona the brit · Accepted Answer

0tinker00 05002br
00noun02br
00100 00 00UK00 00when you make small changes to something:02br
00I'll just have 01b00a02b00 tinker 01b00with02b00 the television and see if I can get it to work.02br
02br
00200 00[C]00 00especially in the past, a person who travels from place to place, repairing pans or other metal containers02br
02br
00So, it could be either or both meanings in the title.0250hrefhttp://www.EnglishForward.com/English/define.asp?dict=CALD&key=83275&ph=oncShow phonetics

Miche · Answer

0Thank you, Nona. The problem is that the first meaning does not make much sense with the second part of the headline, while the second meaning is obviously not the case here. Probably "tinkerings" is an American word?0-

BarbaraPA · Answer

0You mess about with things to try to make little improvements, just like Nona said. I've never seen the form "Tinkerings" before, I don't thing, but it's clear to me. It refers to the activities of tyring to take existing things and improve them.0-

Anonymous · Answer

tinkering means to kind of mess around with stuff with out an end goal, just kind of experimenting with tools and stuff

so tinkerings would be the unexpected end results

tinkerings

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