inform

Multiple Entries:
  inform    form  

Concise Oxford English Dictionary © 2008 Oxford University Press:
inform/ɪnˈfɔːm/

▶verb

• 1 give information to.

• 2 (inform on) give incriminating information about (someone) to the police or other authority.

• 3 give an essential or formative principle or quality to: religion informs every aspect of their lives.

– origin ME enforme, informe ‘give form to’, from OFr. enfourmer, from L. informare ‘shape, describe’.

Concise Oxford English Dictionary © 2008 Oxford University Press:
form/fɔːm/

▶noun

• 1 visible shape or configuration.

  ■ style, design, and arrangement in an artistic work as distinct from its content.

• 2 a way in which a thing exists or appears: essays in book form.

  ■ any of the ways in which a word may be spelled, pronounced, or inflected.

  ■ Philosophy the essential nature of a species or thing, especially (in Plato's thought) regarded as an abstract ideal which real things imitate or participate in.

• 3 a type or variety.

• 4 the customary or correct method or procedure.

  ■ a ritual or convention.

• 5 a printed document with blank spaces for information to be inserted.

• 6 chiefly Brit. a class or year in a school.

• 7 the state of a sports player with regard to their current standard of play.

  ■ details of previous performances by a racehorse or greyhound.

  ■ a person's mood and state of health.

  ■ Brit. informal a criminal record.

• 8 Brit. a long bench without a back.

• 9 Printing, chiefly US variant spelling of forme.

• 10 Brit. a hare's lair.

• 11 a temporary wooden structure used to hold concrete during setting.

▶verb

• 1 combine to create (something).

  ■ go to make up.

  ■ establish or develop.

  ■ articulate (a word or other linguistic unit).

• 2 make or be made into a particular form: form the dough into balls.

  ■ (form people/things up or form up) chiefly Military bring or be brought into a certain formation.

– phrases
in (or chiefly Brit. on) form playing or performing well.
off (or chiefly Brit. out of) form not playing or performing well.

– derivatives
formability noun,
formable adjective,
formless adjective,
formlessly adverb,
formlessness noun.

– origin ME: from OFr. forme (n.), fo(u)rmer (v.), both based on L. forma ‘a mould or form’.