Tunability

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. The degree to which a device, instrument or system can be adjusted finely to a desired frequency or setting
2. The capacity of an instrument, circuit or mechanism to be adjusted precisely so that it responds to a particular target value
3. How readily something such as a radio receiver or engine can be modified to operate at a specific setting or pitch

Etymology: Tunability is a modern compound built from "tune" and the suffix "-ability," so its history is really the history of the two pieces joined together. The suffix is the more traveled of the two. It descends from Latin "-abilitas," which came into English by way of Middle French "-ablete" and Middle English "-ablete" (later "-able" plus "-ity"), carrying the sense of "capable of being" that many English words in "-able" and "-ability" still express. The base, "tune," has a different and older route. It is the same word as "tone," and it came into English in the Middle Ages as a variant of that term, first in the sense of a musical sound or melody and only later in the sense of adjusting an instrument to the correct pitch. "Tunability" therefore describes the quality of being able to be brought into tune, a sense that came together only when the two parts were combined in English.

Synonyms: adjustability