Monitor

British class of armoured warship, used during World War I for operations in shallow waters. They were slow and were equipped with a limited number of very large guns but had a low freeboard (the deck was designed to be close to the water) and so provided a very small target and had greater stability when firing guns.

Armed with two 12-inch guns, they were successfully used to bombard German defences on the Belgian coast and more were built, some carrying 18-inch guns. The Mersey was also sent to East Africa in 1915 to bombard the German cruiser Konigsberg in the Rufiji delta.

monitor

Output device on which a computer displays information for the benefit of the operator user - usually in the form of a graphical user interface such as Windows. The commonest type is the cathode-ray tube (CRT), which is similar to a television screen although liquid crystal display ( LCD) screens (as used by portable computers) are now becoming standard.