practical

I

(New American Roget's College Thesaurus)

adj. usable, useful; advisable; practicable, pragmatic, feasible, effective. See possibility, utility. Ant., impractical.

II

(Roget's IV) modif.

Syn. matter-of-fact, pragmatic, unimaginative, solid, practicable, feasible, workable, functional, useful, sound, sound-thinking, down-to-earth, unRomantic, unsentimental, unidealistic, hardheaded, realistic, sensible, sane, reasonable, rational, to one's advantage, operative, utilitarian, possible, usable, serviceable, efficient, effective, working, nuts-and-bolts*, with both feet on the ground*.

Ant. impractical*, visionary, impracticable, unserviceable.

Syn.- practical , when used of things, stresses usefulness and effectiveness as tested by actual experience, and when used of people, stresses a sensible, realistic approach to life or to the particular circumstances; practicable is used of something that appears to be capable of being done or put into effect, but has not yet been developed or tried [ before the era of electronics, television did not seem practicable ; today it is but one of the practical applications of the science ]

III

(Roget's 3 Superthesaurus) a.

useful, realistic, utilitarian, sensible, down-to-earth, sane, workable, practicable, functional, serviceable, pragmatic.

ANT.: impractical, unworkable, unrealistic

IV

(Roget's Thesaurus II) adjective 1. Resulting from experience or practice: practiced. See KNOWLEDGE. 2. Serving or capable of serving a useful purpose: functional, handy, practicable, serviceable, useful, utilitarian. See USED. 3. Having or indicating an awareness of things as they really are: down-to-earth, hard, hardheaded, matter-of-fact, objective, pragmatic, pragmatical, prosaic, realistic, sober, tough-minded, unromantic. See EXCITE, REAL. 4. Involved in the essential nature of something but not shown or developed: implicit, virtual. See BE, SHOW.