default

/dəˈfɔlt / (say duh'fawlt)

noun
1. failure to act; neglect.
2. failure to meet financial obligations.
3. Law failure to perform an act or obligation legally required, especially to appear in court or to plead at a time assigned.
4. failure to participate in or complete anything, as a scheduled match.
5. want; lack; absence: *And he would let her bind his table-napkin round his neck, and even, in default of Mary, feed him with a spoon –henry handel richardson, 1929.
6. Computers a course which a program automatically follows in the absence of any specific alternative instruction.
7. a procedure which has pre-set parameters which operate unless changed by the user.
–verb (i)
8. to fail in fulfilling or satisfying an engagement, claim, or obligation.
9. to fail to meet financial engagements, or to account properly for money, etc., in one's care.
10. Law to fail to appear in court.
11.
a. to fail to participate in or complete anything, as a match.
b. to lose a match by default.
–verb (t)
12. to fail to perform or pay.
13. to declare to be in default, especially legally.
14. Law to lose by failure to appear in court.
15.
a. to fail to compete in (a game, race, etc.).
b. to lose by default.
–phrase
16. by default, in the absence of a specific command, purposeful action, etc.: *This is where Australia has now arrived. Externally, largely by luck or default or someone else's initiative –stephen fitzgerald, 1977.
{Middle English defaute, from Old French, from defaillir, after faute and faillir. See fault}