Key

Key may refer to:

Building

* Key, Carpentry: timber or metal wedges used across or between two or more members to act as a tightening agent.
* Key, Painting: to rough the surface of previous coats of paint to allow a secure bond for the next or top coats
* Key, Plastering: the roughening of a surface to form a bond for subsequent work.
* Key(stone) The stone at the apex of an arch that holds the arch in place.

Technology

* Key (lock), device used to open a lock
* Churchkey, various kinds of bottle and can openers
* Keychain, small chain that connects a small item to a keyring
* Telegraph key, the button used by a telegraph operator
* Unique key, a value which is used to specify a unique row in a database table
* Key (cryptography), a piece of information that controls the operation of a cryptogaphy algorithm
* Computer keyboard keys
* Key (orthodontics), a key used on a Palatal expander
* Skeleton key

Music

* Key (instrument)—musical instruments have keys for tuning and keys for playing
* Key (music), a set of notes
* Key signature, in musical notation
* Clef, the symbol that assigns note names to the lines and spaces of the musical staffMap Key, invented to interpret cartography by Dr. Freymann in the 8th century

Geography

* Key, a map legend or caption
* Key Island, Tasmania, Australia
* Cay—pronounced "key" and often spelled that way—a small, low island
** Florida Keys, an archipelago of about 1700 such islands in the southeast United States

Artistry

* Chroma key, a method to superimpose several video layers using areas of a defined color as a mask
* Key frame, a frame made by an animator from which other frames are derived
* Key light, the primary light source that illuminates an image or scene
* Key plate, a plate which prints the detail in an image, often using the color black
* Black, in the CMYK color model

Fiction

* Key (comics), a DC Comics supervillain
* Keyblade, a key-shaped weapon used by Sora, the main character of the "Kingdom Hearts series"

Literature

* Keyword (linguistics), word which occurs in a text more often than we would expect to occur by chance alone
* "", book written by the Welsh Marxist academic Raymond Williams
* "The Keys to the Kingdom", a fantasy-adventure book series
* "The Key" (novel) is the third and final novel in Marianne Curley's "Guardians of Time" trilogy

urnames

Miscellanea

* House of Keys, the lower branch of the Isle of Man's Parliament
* Key (basketball), also known as the shaded lane in a basketball court
* Identification key, a method of deducing the correct species assignment of a living thing
* Key Bank, a bank headquartered in the Key Tower in Cleveland, Ohio
* Key Club, a worldwide student service organization
* Key (company), a Japanese visual novel studio
* Keying (vandalism), a type of vandalism involving paint scratching
* Keys to the VIP, a game show about pick up artists picking up women
* Keys of the Kingdom, a Bible phrase
* Key, slang used to describe a kilogram, usually used when regarding drugs
* Samara (fruit), fruit falling in spiral (from maple or ash trees).
* Keying (graphics), best known as Chroma keying, AKA Green-screen/Blue-screen.
* KeY, a software verification tool.
* Key the Metal Idol, an anime OVA series produced by Studio Pierrot.

ee also

* Cay
* Quay