Small letters as opposed to capital letters (upper case)
‘the name may be typed in lower case’
‘lower-case letters’
‘Of these we have given both the upper case and lower case versions of the 24 classical letters.’
‘That author gave brown in lower case and Betty in upper case; and, in default of evidence to the contrary, it seems best to go along with the view that Betty is here a proper name.’
‘Capital letters generally are larger than lower-case letters.’
‘Begin your title with a capital letter, then follow with lower-case letters.’
‘Print an alphabet letter, either capital or lower case or both, on the boxes.’
‘For the sake of simplicity we shall disregard lower-case letters and settle for typing all to be in capitals, and we shall disregard leap years.’
‘Actually, I pretty much agree - if I'd known it was going to be in upper and lower case lettering when I wrote the script, I certainly wouldn't have used so many stressed words.’
‘Minuscule script, which developed around 800 AD, consisted of lower case letters and was much more compact and easy to read.’
‘Several researchers have shown that presenting a cue word in upper-case letters relative to the majority of lower-case words results in superior prospective memory performance.’
‘All digits, primes, and target stimuli were presented in lower case letters, in the font Helvetica, bold, and size 24.’
‘Yes, one of the world's most unfriendly companies had transformed itself into a ‘friendly, open, trusted’ organisation simply by using lower-case letters and some pastel colours.’
‘Use passwords that are difficult to guess - combine upper- and lower-case letters and numbers, for instance, rather than use common nicknames or pets' names.’
‘And so the idea of Hungarian notation was born, in which each variable is prefixed by lower-case letters indicating useful things about it.’
‘That's been true ever since personal computers started being able to use lower-case letters more than 20 years ago.’
‘The most distinctive element of the typeface is its enormous lower-case x-height.’
‘Designed in bright colors to be more welcoming and friendly, the new logo features Broder spelled in all lower case, with each letter a different color.’
‘The function to return the calling name returned it in lower case under Version 3.’
‘We always recommend that passwords should include a mix of letters and numbers, upper and lower case and should be as random as possible.’
‘The liner notes are notable as well, but why are they in lower case, and in an 8-point sans serif font?’
‘It's five characters, all alphas, and probably all lower case.’
Origin
Referring originally to the lower of two cases of type positioned on an angled stand for use by a compositor (see upper case).
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