Partly onomatopoeic, and partly continuing Middle English pingen (“to push, shove, pierce, stab, prod, goad, urge, feel remorse, incite”), from Old English pyngan (“to prick”), in turn likely from pungere. Compare English pang.
Meanings
A high-pitched, short and somewhat sharp sound.
My car used to make an odd ping, but after the last oil change it went away.
With a sudden ping, there was a rabbit there in the black labyrinth with him[.] 1982, Douglas Adams, Life, the Universe and Everything, page 89:
(qualifier:submarine navigation) A pulse of high-pitched or ultrasonic sound whose echoes provide information about nearby objects and vessels.
The submarine sent out a ping and got an echo from a battleship.
A packet which a remote host is expected to echo, thus indicating its presence.
The network is overloaded from all the pings going out.
(Internet) An email or other message sent requesting acknowledgement.
I sent a ping to the insurance company to see if they received our claim.
Latency.
"You low ping c**t, you only win cos of your ping!"
> > And other such insights into why I was winning. 2000 November 8, the_mad...@my-deja.com, “HL DM with a low ping.......”, in alt.games.half-life (Usenet):
Your best bet to negate lag is to go to a server using the zero ping mutator. This will compensate for your high ping when using a pistol, sniper or […] 2002 June 24, drip, “Bandwidth - Lagtime”, in alt.games.unreal.tournament (Usenet):
A means of highlighting a feature on the game map so that allied players can see it.
fa پینگ (a packet which a remote host is expected to echo) · mr पिंग (a packet which a remote host is expected to echo) · fi kilahdus (a high-pitched, short and somewhat sharp sound) · hu ping (a packet which a remote host is expected to echo) · fi kilahdus (an email or other message sent requesting acknowledgement) · gl ping (a packet which a remote host is expected to echo) · bg свистене (a high-pitched, short and somewhat sharp sound) · es ping (a packet which a remote host is expected to echo) · cs cinknutí (a high-pitched, short and somewhat sharp sound)
Partly onomatopoeic, and partly continuing Middle English pingen (“to push, shove, pierce, stab, prod, goad, urge, feel remorse, incite”), from Old English pyngan (“to prick”), in turn likely from pungere. Compare English pang.
Meanings
To make a high-pitched, short and somewhat sharp sound.
My car was pinging until my last oil change.
The microwave pinged. He forked the steak onto the plate and set the timer again. 2013, Francine Rivers, And the Shofar Blew:
(qualifier:submarine navigation) To emit a signal and then listen for its echo in order to detect objects.
To send a packet in order to determine whether a host is present, particularly by use of the ping utility.
I'm pinging their server.
Just because you cannot ping a server or telnet to it does not mean that the server is down or inaccessible. 2008, Allan Reid, Jim Lorenz, Working at a Small-to-Medium Business or ISP, Cisco Press, →ISBN:
The server pings its affiliates periodically.
(broadly) To send an email or other message to someone in hopes of eliciting a response.
If certain attendees don't actively participate and that's a surprise to you, ping them an email or private chat message and ask what's happening for them. 2014, Jessica Pryce-Jones, Julia Lindsay, Running Great Meetings and Workshops For Dummies, John Wiley & Sons, →ISBN, page 294:
If any deeper etymology is required, Arthur, don't ping me; I'll ping you. 2001 November 25, William Safire, “On Language; The Arab Street”, in New York Times:
I'll ping the insurance company again to see if they've received our claim.
(colloquial) To flick.
I pinged the crumb off the table with my finger.
(colloquial, intransitive) To bounce.
At that moment a rifle cracked. The bullet pinged against the railings and whirred off on a ricochet. 1951, John Wyndham, The Day of the Triffids, Harmondsworth: Penguin Books, published 1954, page 101:
The ball pinged off the wall and came hurtling back.
(colloquial, transitive) To cause something to bounce.
Charging through the Bolton midfield to find a free moment, Essien then pinged the ball into the space into which Drogba was intelligently running. 2010 December 29, Chris Whyatt, “Chelsea 1 - 0 Bolton”, in BBC:
(colloquial) To call out audibly.
However, after an inside pass from Moody to Tom Croft and a surge from the England blind-side, number eight James Haskell was eventually pinged from in front of the posts for not releasing. 2011 September 24, Ben Dirs, “Rugby World Cup 2011: England 67-3 Romania”, in BBC Sport:
(Australia, colloquial) To penalize.
Gary Ablett was pinged for holding the ball and gave away a free kick.
(ambitransitive, slang) To trigger a person's gaydar; to look or act obviously homosexual.
Plus, he pings her gaydar big time, although there's nothing obvious about it in his comportment. 2022, Maxim Jakubowski, The Book of Extraordinary Femme Fatale Stories:
hu ráüzen (to send an email or other message to someone in hopes of eliciting a response) · hu pingel (to send a packet in order to determine whether a host is present) · fi näpäyttää (to flick) · bg отскачам (to bounce) · ca pinguejar (to send a packet in order to determine whether a host is present) · fi kimmottaa (to cause something to bounce) · hu ráír (to send an email or other message to someone in hopes of eliciting a response) · bg свистя (to make a high-pitched, short and somewhat sharp sound) · fi pingata (to send a packet in order to determine whether a host is present) · de pingen (to send a packet in order to determine whether a host is present) · nl pingen (to send a packet in order to determine whether a host is present) · fi kimmota (to bounce) · fi kilahtaa (to make a high-pitched, short and somewhat sharp sound) · fi kaikuluodata (to emit a signal and then listen for its echo in order to detect objects) · hu megpingel (to send an email or other message to someone in hopes of eliciting a response) · cs cvrnknout (to flick) · cs cinknout (to make a high-pitched, short and somewhat sharp sound) · cmn ping (to send a packet in order to determine whether a host is present)