mobile

Meanings

1. 1
   adj

   capable of changing quickly from one state or condition to another

   a highly mobile face

2. 2
   adj

   moving or capable of moving readily (especially from place to place)

   a mobile missile system

3. 3
   adj

   migratory

   a restless mobile society

4. 4
   adj

   Capable of being moved, especially on wheels.

   a mobile home

5. 5
   adj

   Pertaining to or by agency of mobile phones.

   mobile number

6. 6
   adj

   Characterized by an extreme degree of fluidity; moving or flowing with great freedom.

   Mercury is a mobile liquid.

7. 7
   adj

   Easily moved in feeling, purpose, or direction; excitable; changeable; fickle.

   the quick and mobile curiosity of her disposition

8. 8
   adj

   Changing in appearance and expression under the influence of the mind.

   mobile features

Etymology

From Middle English, from Old French, from Latin mōbilis (“easy to be moved, moveable”), from moveō (“move”). The video-gaming sense was coined by Richard Bartle to describe NPCs or creatures capable of moving "under their own power" in the 1978 video game Multi-User Dungeon. Bartle retracted an earlier claim of his that it was from the kinetic sculpture sense of mobile (for the "unpredictable but limited" motion of the hanging ornaments).