revert

Etymology

From Old French revertir, from Vulgar Latin *revertiō, variant of Latin revertō.

noun

1. One who, or that which, reverts.
2. (religion) One who reverts to that religion which he had adhered to before having converted to another
   … Cyril III ibn Laqlaq’s correspondence which reflects genuine—if intentionally vague—concern for the secretive community of Christian converts and reverts [who had converted to Islam before]. 2010, Kurt J. Werthmuller, Coptic Identity and Ayyubid Politics in Egypt: 1218-1250, page 77
3. (Islam, due to the belief that all people are born Muslim) A convert to Islam.
   Zeba Siddiqui, herself a revert and editor of the Parent's Manual: A Guide for Muslim Parents Living in North America, contributed to this book as a consultant. 1997, Islamic Society of North America, Islamic horizons, page 27
   Parents should not reject a proposal without good reason — and being a revert with a past is not an acceptable one. 2001, Islamic Society of North America, Islamic horizons
4. (computing) The act of reversion (of e.g. a database transaction or source control repository) to an earlier state.
   We've found that git reverts are at least an order of magnitude faster than SVN reverse merges.
5. The skateboard maneuver of rotating the board 180 degrees or more while the wheels remain on the ground.
   In short tutorials, the player learns the basics of skating: reverts, manuals and the ollie […] 2007, Friedrich von Borries, Steffen P. Walz, Matthias Böttger, Space Time Play: Computer Games, Architecture and Urbanism, page 124

verb

1. (transitive, now rare) To turn back, or turn to the contrary; to reverse.
   Till happy Chance reverts the cruel scene. c. 1700, Matthew Prior, A Passage in the Moriae Encomium of Erasmus
2. To throw back; to reflect; to reverberate.
3. (transitive) To cause to return to a former condition.
4. (intransitive, now rare) To return; to come back.
   If they attack, we will revert to the bunker.
5. (intransitive) To return to the possession of.
   When a book goes out of print, rights revert from the publisher to the author.
   1. (intransitive, law) Of an estate: To return to its former owner, or to his or her heirs, when a grant comes to an end.
6. (transitive) To cause (a property or rights) to return to the previous owner.
   Sometimes a publisher will automatically revert rights back to an author once a book has gone out of print.
7. (intransitive) To return to a former practice, condition, belief, etc.
   Now that she had rested and had fed from the luncheon tray Mrs. Broome had just removed, she had reverted to her normal gaiety. She looked cool in a grey tailored cotton dress with a terracotta scarf and shoes and her hair a black silk helmet. 1963, Margery Allingham, chapter 2, in The China Governess
8. (intransitive, biology) To return to an earlier or primitive type or state; to take on the traits or characters of an ancestral type.
9. (intransitive) To change back, as from a soluble to an insoluble state or the reverse.
   Phosphoric acid in certain fertilizers reverts.
10. (intransitive) To take up again or return to a previous topic.
11. (intransitive, in Muslim usage, due to the belief that all people are born Muslim) To convert to Islam.
    He added that Islam is the religion of justice which rejects injustice, referring to the case of Mike Tyson and how he has become a real problem to the West since he reverted to Islam. 1995, Wizārat al-Iʻlām wa-al-Thaqāfah, “Sudanow”, in (Please provide the book title or journal name), volume 20
    The mission of 'translating' the Qur'an had preoccupied Pickthall's mind since he reverted to Islam. 1997, Islamic Society of North America, Islamic horizons
    But once he reverted to Islam, he attended as many lectures as he could, listened to Islamic tapes and the recitations of Qur'an. Subtly and gradually his moods were stabilized, and he started to have positive outlook on life. 2003, Islamic Revival Association, Al Jumuʻah: Volume 15, Issues 7-12
12. (intransitive, nonstandard, proscribed, originally India, now also, Singapore, Malaysia, Hong Kong) To reply (to correspondence, etc.).
    Please revert before Monday.
13. (transitive, mathematics) To treat (a series, such as y = a + bx + cx² + ..., where one variable y is expressed in powers of a second variable x), so as to find the second variable x expressed in a series arranged in powers of y.
    First we revert the series expansion (3.6) to give z(ζ) as a series in z. 1990, George A. Baker, Jr., J. D. Johnson, “Thomas-Fermi Equation of State - The Hot Curve”, in Valdir C. Aguilera-Navarro, editor, Condensed Matter Theories, volume 5, page 5
    To express z as a power series of nλ³, we first expand g_(3/2)(z) in z […] We then revert the power series to express z in terms of nλ³. 2005, Frank Y. Wang, Physics with MAPLE: The Computer Algebra Resource for Mathematical Methods in Physics, pages 518–9
    We can revert the series expansion of ⟨n⟩λ³_T/g […] and obtain a series expansion for the fugacity z in terms of ⟨n⟩λ³_T/g, […] 2016, Linda E. Reichl, A Modern Course in Statistical Physics, 4th edition, page 218