Word forms: plural, 3rd person singular presenttense tinkers, present participle tinkering, past tense, past participle tinkered
1. verb
If you tinker with something, you make some small changes to it, in an attempt to improve it or repair it.
Instead of the Government admitting its error, it just tinkered with the problem. [VERB + with]
They tinkered with the engine. [VERBwith noun]
It is not enough to tinker at the edges; we must reconstruct the entire system. [VERB]
Synonyms: meddle, play, toy, monkey More Synonyms of tinker
tinkeringuncountable noun
No amount of tinkering is going to improve matters.
2. countable noun
In former times, a tinker was a person who did not have a fixed home, but travelled from place to place mending metal pots and doing other small repair jobs.
3. countable noun
Some people refer to any traveller or gipsy, especially one who is Irish, as a tinker.
[British, offensive]
tinker in British English
(ˈtɪŋkə)
noun
1.
(esp formerly) a travelling mender of pots and pans
2.
a clumsy worker
3.
the act of tinkering
4. Scottish and Irish derogatory another name for Gypsy
5. British informal
a mischievous child
6.
any of several small mackerels that occur off the North American coast of the Atlantic
verb
7. (intransitive; foll bywith)
to play, fiddle, or meddle (with machinery, etc), esp while undertaking repairs
8.
to mend (pots and pans) as a tinker
Derived forms
tinkerer (ˈtinkerer)
noun
Word origin
C13 tinkere, perhaps from tink tinkle, of imitative origin
tinker in American English
(ˈtɪŋkər)
noun
1.
a usually itinerant person who mends pots, pans, etc.
2. [sometimesT-] Chiefly Irish Chiefly Scottish
Gypsy (sense 1)
3.
a person who can make all kinds of minor repairs; jack-of-all-trades
4.
a clumsy or unskillful worker; bungler
5. US
a young mackerel
verb intransitive
6.
to work as a tinker
7.
to make clumsy or tentative attempts to mend or repair something
8.
to fuss or putter aimlessly or uselessly
verb transitive
9.
to mend as a tinker; patch up
Derived forms
tinkerer (ˈtinkerer)
noun
Word origin
ME tinkere < ? or akin to tinken, to make a tinkling sound
Synonyms of 'tinker'
meddle, play, toy, monkey
More Synonyms of tinker
In other languages
tinker
British English: tinker VERB
If you tinker with something, you make some small changes to it, in an attempt to improve it or repair it.
American English: tinker
Brazilian Portuguese: remendar
Chinese: 小修改
European Spanish: retocar
French: bricoler
German: herumbasteln
Italian: armeggiare
Japanese: いじる
Korean: 어설프게 손보다
European Portuguese: remendar
Latin American Spanish: retocar
Chinese translation of 'tinker'
tinker
(ˈtɪŋkəʳ)
vi
to tinker with sth随(隨)意乱(亂)修某物 (suíyì luàn xiū mǒuwù)
n(c)
(= pot mender) 补(補)锅(鍋)匠 (bǔguōjiàng) (个(個), gè)
(Brit, inf!, = gipsy) 浪人 (làngrén)
(verb)
Definition
to try to repair or improve (something) by making lots of minor adjustments
Instead of admitting their error, they just tinkered with the problem.
Synonyms
meddle
play
He's not working, he's just playing around.
toy
monkey
potter
She was pottering around in the garden.
fiddle (informal)
He fiddled with the radio dial.
dabble
She dabbled with politics at university.
mess about
muck about (British, slang)
Additional synonyms
in the sense of dabble
Definition
to be involved in an activity in a superficial way