cross the t's and dot the i's

cross the t's and dot the i's

English

Verb

cross the t's and dot the i's (third-person singular simple present crosses the t's and dots the i's, present participle crossing the t's and dotting the i's, simple past and past participle crossed the t's and dotted the i's)

1. Alternative form of dot the i's and cross the t's
   • 1980, United States. Congress. House. Committee on Appropriations. Subcommittee on the Departments of State, Justice, and Commerce, the Judiciary, and Related Agencies, Departments of State, Justice, and Commerce, the Judiciary, and related agencies appropriations for 1981: hearings before a subcommittee of the Committee on Appropriations, House of Representatives, Ninety-sixth Congress, second session, Part 9, U.S. Government Printing Office, page 444:

     Regional office technical staffs do the main nuts and bolts crossing the "t's" and dotting the "i's", if you will , providing the types of expertise , financial or otherwise , that it is unfair to expect EDRs to have to that degree and that depth.

   • 2013, James H. Mittelman, Underdevelopment and the Transition to Socialism: Mozambique and Tanzania, Elsevier, →ISBN, page 232:

     […] at the September signing of the Lusaka Agreement, which, other than straightening out details, really amounted to crossing the t's and dotting the i's; and during the four phases of economic and technical negotiations when, under the cover of building fraternal relations, neocolonial persuasions surfaced.