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in all but name

From Wiktionary, the free dictionary

English

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Prepositional phrase

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in all but name

  1. In practice, though in an unacknowledged way.
    Synonyms: de facto, for all intents and purposes, for all practical purposes, in practice, practically, virtually
    • 1839, Edgar Allan Poe, “William Wilson”, in Tales of the Grotesque and Arabesque[1], Philadelphia: Lea and Blanchard, published 1940, page 29:
      Thenceforth my voice was a household law; and at an age when few children have abandoned their leading-strings, I was left to the guidance of my own will, and became, in all but name, the master of my own actions.
    • 1935, Christopher Isherwood, chapter 5, in Mr Norris Changes Trains[2], Penguin, published 1942, page 49:
      ‘Do you mean to say that you’ve become a communist?’
      In all but name, William, yes. In all but name.’
    • 2012, Katie Kitamura, Gone to the Forest, New York: Free Press, Chapter 5, p. 76,
      He thinks: I have been running the farm in all but name. Leave and nothing here will change. You will see.