well-formed

See also: wellformed

English

Adjective

well-formed (comparative better-formed or more well-formed, superlative best-formed or most well-formed)

1. (linguistics, computing) Correctly written; syntactically correct; expressed in a way that obeys rules for constructing formulas in a certain language.

   If the parser says it is good, then it must be well-formed and is part of the language.

Usage notes

• In the context of certain computer languages, such as XML, well-formed may have a very specific and precisely defined meaning.

Antonyms

• ill-formed

Hyponyms

• formed

Derived terms

• well-formedness

Related terms

• well-formed formula

Translations

syntactically correct

• Dutch: welgevormd (nl), goed (nl) gevormd (nl)
• German: wohlgeformt (de)
• Irish: dea-chumtha