The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48:

Fork \Fork\, v. i. [imp. & p. p. Forked; p. pr. & vb. n.
   Forking.]
   1. To shoot into blades, as corn.
      [1913 Webster]

            The corn beginneth to fork.           --Mortimer.
      [1913 Webster]

   2. To divide into two or more branches; as, a road, a tree,
      or a stream forks.
      [1913 Webster]

The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48:

Fork \Fork\, v. t.
   To raise, or pitch with a fork, as hay; to dig or turn over
   with a fork, as the soil.
   [1913 Webster]

         Forking the sheaves on the high-laden cart. --Prof.
                                                  Wilson.
   [1913 Webster]

   To fork over To fork out, to hand or pay over, as money;
      to cough up. [Slang] --G. Eliot.
      [1913 Webster]

The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48:

Fork \Fork\ (f[^o]rk), n. [AS. forc, fr. L. furca. Cf.
   Fourch['e], Furcate.]
   1. An instrument consisting of a handle with a shank
      terminating in two or more prongs or tines, which are
      usually of metal, parallel and slightly curved; -- used
      for piercing, holding, taking up, or pitching anything.
      [1913 Webster]

   2. Anything furcate or like a fork in shape, or furcate at
      the extremity; as, a tuning fork.
      [1913 Webster]

   3. One of the parts into which anything is furcated or
      divided; a prong; a branch of a stream, a road, etc.; a
      barbed point, as of an arrow.
      [1913 Webster]

            Let it fall . . . though the fork invade
            The region of my heart.               --Shak.
      [1913 Webster]

            A thunderbolt with three forks.       --Addison.
      [1913 Webster]

   4. The place where a division or a union occurs; the angle or
      opening between two branches or limbs; as, the fork of a
      river, a tree, or a road.
      [1913 Webster]

   5. The gibbet. [Obs.] --Bp. Butler.
      [1913 Webster]

   Fork beam (Shipbuilding), a half beam to support a deck,
      where hatchways occur.

   Fork chuck (Wood Turning), a lathe center having two prongs
      for driving the work.

   Fork head.
      (a) The barbed head of an arrow.
      (b) The forked end of a rod which forms part of a knuckle
          joint.

   In fork. (Mining) A mine is said to be in fork, or an
      engine to "have the water in fork," when all the water is
      drawn out of the mine. --Ure.

   The forks of a river or The forks of a road, the branches
      into which it divides, or which come together to form it;
      the place where separation or union takes place.
      [1913 Webster]

The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48:

Bracket \Brack"et\, n. [Cf. OF. braguette codpiece, F. brayette,
   Sp. bragueta, also a projecting mold in architecture; dim.
   fr. L. bracae breeches; cf. also, OF. bracon beam, prop,
   support; of unknown origin. Cf. Breeches.]
   [1913 Webster]
   1. (Arch.) An architectural member, plain or ornamental,
      projecting from a wall or pier, to support weight falling
      outside of the same; also, a decorative feature seeming to
      discharge such an office.
      [1913 Webster]

   Note: This is the more general word. See Brace,
         Cantalever, Console, Corbel, Strut.
         [1913 Webster]

   2. (Engin. & Mech.) A piece or combination of pieces, usually
      triangular in general shape, projecting from, or fastened
      to, a wall, or other surface, to support heavy bodies or
      to strengthen angles.
      [1913 Webster]

   3. (Naut.) A shot, crooked timber, resembling a knee, used as
      a support.
      [1913 Webster]

   4. (Mil.) The cheek or side of an ordnance carriage.
      [1913 Webster]

   5. (Print.) One of two characters [], used to inclose a
      reference, explanation, or note, or a part to be excluded
      from a sentence, to indicate an interpolation, to rectify
      a mistake, or to supply an omission, and for certain other
      purposes; -- called also crotchet.
      [1913 Webster]

   6. A gas fixture or lamp holder projecting from the face of a
      wall, column, or the like.
      [1913 Webster]

   7. (Gunnery) A figure determined by firing a projectile
      beyond a target and another short of it, as a basis for
      ascertaining the proper elevation of the piece; -- only
      used in the phrase, to establish a bracket. After the
      bracket is established shots are fired with intermediate
      elevations until the exact range is obtained. In the
      United States navy it is called fork.
      [Webster 1913 Suppl.]

   Bracket light, a gas fixture or a lamp attached to a wall,
      column, etc.
      [1913 Webster]

WordNet (r) 3.0 (2006):

fork
    n 1: cutlery used for serving and eating food
    2: the act of branching out or dividing into branches [syn:
       branching, ramification, fork, forking]
    3: the region of the angle formed by the junction of two
       branches; "they took the south fork"; "he climbed into the
       crotch of a tree" [syn: fork, crotch]
    4: an agricultural tool used for lifting or digging; has a
       handle and metal prongs
    5: the angle formed by the inner sides of the legs where they
       join the human trunk [syn: crotch, fork]
    v 1: lift with a pitchfork; "pitchfork hay" [syn: pitchfork,
         fork]
    2: place under attack with one's own pieces, of two enemy pieces
    3: divide into two or more branches so as to form a fork; "The
       road forks" [syn: branch, ramify, fork, furcate,
       separate]
    4: shape like a fork; "She forked her fingers"

Moby Thesaurus II by Grady Ward, 1.0:

162 Moby Thesaurus words for "fork":
   L, V, affluent, angle, angle off, apex, bail, bayou, bend,
   bifurcate, bifurcation, bight, billabong, bine, bisect, bough,
   bowl, branch, branch out, branchedness, branchiness, bucket,
   burgeon, by two, cant, cast, catapult, chevron, chuck, chunk,
   cleave, coin, confluent, confluent stream, corner, crank, crook,
   crotch, crotchet, crutch, cup, cut in two, cutlery, dart, dash,
   deadwood, decant, deflection, delta, dendritic drainage pattern,
   dichotomize, dimidiate, dining utensils, dip, dish, dish out,
   dish up, divaricate, divide, dogleg, effluent, elbow, ell, fan,
   feeder, fire, fission, flagellum, flat silver, flatware, fling,
   flip, forks, frond, furcate, furcation, furcula, furculum, groin,
   halve, heave, hollow ware, hook, hurl, hurtle, in half, inflection,
   inguen, jerk, knee, knives, ladle, lance, launch, let fly, limb,
   lob, nook, offshoot, pass, peg, pelt, pitch, pitchfork, point,
   pour, prong, put, put the shot, quoin, ramage, ramification,
   ramify, runner, sarment, scion, scoop, serve, shoot, shovel, shy,
   silver, silver plate, silverware, sling, slip, snap, spade, spear,
   split in two, spoon, spoons, spray, sprig, sprit, sprout,
   stainless-steel ware, stem, stolon, subdivide, sucker, swerve,
   switch, tablespoon, tableware, teaspoon, tendril, thallus, throw,
   tilt, toss, transect, tributary, trident, trifurcate, twig, veer,
   vertex, wishbone, zag, zig, zigzag



The Jargon File (version 4.4.7, 29 Dec 2003):

fork


    In the open-source community, a fork is what occurs when two (or more)
    versions of a software package's source code are being developed in
    parallel which once shared a common code base, and these multiple versions
    of the source code have irreconcilable differences between them. This
    should not be confused with a development branch, which may later be folded
    back into the original source code base. Nor should it be confused with
    what happens when a new distribution of Linux or some other distribution is
    created, because that largely assembles pieces than can and will be used in
    other distributions without conflict.

    Forking is uncommon; in fact, it is so uncommon that individual instances
    loom large in hacker folklore. Notable in this class were the Emacs/XEmacs
    fork, the GCC/EGCS fork (later healed by a merger) and the forks among the
    FreeBSD, NetBSD, and OpenBSD operating systems.


The Free On-line Dictionary of Computing (30 December 2018):

fork

    A Unix system call used by a process
   (the "parent") to make a copy (the "child") of itself.  The
   child process is identical to the parent except it has a
   different process identifier and a zero return value from
   the fork call.  It is assumed to have used no resources.

   A fork followed by an exec can be used to start a different
   process but this can be inefficient and some later Unix
   variants provide vfork as an alternative mechanism for this.

   See also fork bomb.

   (1996-12-08)


The Devil's Dictionary (1881-1906):

FORK, n.  An instrument used chiefly for the purpose of putting dead
animals into the mouth.  Formerly the knife was employed for this
purpose, and by many worthy persons is still thought to have many
advantages over the other tool, which, however, they do not altogether
reject, but use to assist in charging the knife.  The immunity of
these persons from swift and awful death is one of the most striking
proofs of God's mercy to those that hate Him.