rig

Etymology 1

From Early Modern English rygge, probably of North Germanic origin. Compare Norwegian rigge (“to bind up; wrap around; rig; equip”), Swedish dialectal rigga (“to rig a horse”), Faroese rigga (“to rig; to equip and fit; to make s.th. function”). Possibly from Proto-Germanic *rik- (“to bind”), from Proto-Indo-European *rign-, *reyg- (“to bind”); or related to Old English *wrīhan, wrīohan, wrēohan, wrēon (“to bind; wrap up; cover”). See also wry (“to cover; clothe; dress; hide”).

noun

1. (nautical) The rigging of a sailing ship or other such craft.
2. Special equipment or gear used for a particular purpose.
   The climbers each had a different rig for climbing that particular rockface.
3. (US) A large truck such as a semi-trailer truck.
   Every rig at the truckstop had custom-made mud-flaps.
   "Big Joe's the name," an' I told him mine / He said: "The name of my rig is Phantom 309." 1967, Tommy Faile (lyrics and music), “Phantom 309”, performed by Red Sovine
   There's armored cars, and tanks, and Jeeps And rigs of every size. Yeah, them chicken coops was full o'bears And choppers filled the skies. 1975, “Convoy”, in C.W. McCall, Chip Davis (lyrics), Black Bear Road, performed by C. W. McCall
4. The special apparatus used for drilling wells.
5. (informal) A costume or an outfit.
   My sister and I always made our own rigs for Halloween.
6. (slang, computing) A personal computer, typically one modified for looks.
   When I saw a special version of Quake running on Voodoo hardware, I knew I would be forking out quite a bit of money on my gaming rig. 2004, Radford Castro, Let Me Play: Stories of Gaming and Emulation, page 104
7. An imperfectly castrated horse, sheep etc.
8. (slang) Radio equipment, especially a citizen's band transceiver.
9. (slang) Equipment used for taking recreational drugs.
   […] does not know how to pick up the liquid from the cooker, and he asks someone else to use his rig to put his part in his rig. 1995, Reyes Ramos, An Ethnographic Study of Heroin Abuse by Mexican Americans in San Antonio, Texas, page 36
   (Gregg later admitted Cher's inadvertent discovery of his “rig” [drug bag] complete with heroin, needles, and rubber bands, hastened their breakup.) 2014, Josiah Howard, Cher: Strong Enough
10. (animation) A model outfitted with parameterized controls for animation.
    As for the facial stuff, I just didn't have the time to do a really good facial rig and just worked with the one I had, which was insufficiently flexible to accomplish what needed to be done. September 20, 2002, Steph Greenberg, “Re: CG Mickey Test”, in rec.arts.animation (Usenet), message-ID <Xns928EB617492BStephG@130.133.1.4>
    As facial models become more and more complex, it is increasingly difficult to define a consistent rig that can work well for every possible movement. 2012, Verónica Orvalho, Pedro Bastos, Frederic Parke, Bruno Oliveira, Xenxo Alvarez, “A Facial Rigging Survey: State of the Art Report”, in EUROGRAPHICS

verb

1. (transitive) To fit out with a harness or other equipment.
   1. (transitive, nautical) To equip and fit (a ship) with sails, shrouds, and yards.
   2. (transitive, manufacturing) To move (a heavy object) with the help of slings, hoists, block and tackle, levers, or similar equipment.
      To rig such massive equipment requires experienced riggers
2. (transitive, informal) To dress or clothe in some costume.
3. (transitive) To make or construct something in haste or in a makeshift manner.
   rig up a makeshift shelter
4. (transitive) To manipulate something dishonestly for personal gain or discriminatory purposes.
   to rig an election
   Policing the relationship between government and business in a free society is difficult.[…]Governments have to find the best people to fill important jobs: there is a limited supply of people who understand the financial system, for example. But governments must also remember that businesses are self-interested actors who will try to rig the system for their own benefit. 2013-08-10, Schumpeter, “Cronies and capitols”, in The Economist, volume 408, number 8848
5. (transitive, obsolete) To make free with; hence, to steal; to pilfer.
6. (transitive, intransitive, animation) To outfit a model with controls for animation.
   We can think of rigging a 3D character as a process analogous to setting up the strings that control a puppet. 2012, Verónica Orvalho, Pedro Bastos, Frederic Parke, Bruno Oliveira, Xenxo Alvarez, “A Facial Rigging Survey: State of the Art Report”, in EUROGRAPHICS

Etymology 2

See ridge.

noun

1. (UK, Scotland, dialect) A ridge.

Etymology 3

Compare wriggle.

noun

1. (obsolete) A wanton; one given to unbecoming conduct.
2. A promiscuous woman.
   However, terrible as it may seem to the tall maiden sisters of J.P.'s in Queen Anne houses with walled vegetable gardens, this courtesan, strumpet, harlot, whore, punk, fille de joie, street-walker, this trollop, this trull, this baggage, this hussy, this drab, skit, rig, quean, mopsy, demirep, demimondaine, this wanton, this fornicatress, this doxy, this concubine, this frail sister, this poor Queenie--did actually solicit me, did actually say 'coming home to-night, dearie' and my soul was not blasted enough to call a policeman. 1936, Anthony Bertram, Like the Phoenix
3. (obsolete) A sportive or unbecoming trick; a frolic.
4. (obsolete) A blast of wind.

verb

1. (intransitive, obsolete) To play the wanton; to act in an unbecoming manner; to play tricks.
   1616, George Chapman, The Hymn to Hermes, in The Whole Works of Homer (tr.), Rigging and rifling all ways, and no noise / Made with thy soft feet, where it all destroys.

Etymology 4

From ring (“algebraic structure”), omitting the letter n to suggest the lack of negatives. Compare rng (“structure like a ring but lacking a multiplicative identity”).

noun

1. (algebra, ring theory) An algebraic structure similar to a ring, but without the requirement that every element have an additive inverse.
   The set of natural numbers N with the usual operations of addition and multiplication is a rig, but not a ring. The set of integers Z is a ring. For a rig/ring (R,0,+,1,−), the set of polynomials R[x] on a generator x with the usual operations of addition and multiplication is also a rig/ring. 2004, ACM SIGPLAN Notices, volume 39, ACM Press, page 81
   2004, Jerzy Marcinkowski (editor), Computer Science Logic: 18th International Workshop, CSL 2004, Proceedings, Springer, LNCS 3210, page 17, It follows that for each object A its endomorphisms End_C(A) = C(A,A) has the structure of what is now called a rig, that is to say a (commutative) ring without negatives.