initialize

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

• transitive verb To set (a starting value of a variable).
• transitive verb To prepare (a computer or a printer) for use; boot.
• transitive verb To format (a storage medium, such as a disk).

from The Century Dictionary.

• To designate by initials instead of by the full name.
• To use an initial or initials (instead of one's full name).

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

• transitive verb to assign an initial value to (a variable or set of variables in a computer program).

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

• verb To assign initial values to something
• verb computing To assign an initial value to a variable
• verb computing To format a storage medium prior to use
• verb computing To prepare any hardware (such as a printer or scanner) for use

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

• verb divide (a disk) into marked sectors so that it may store data
• verb assign an initial value to a computer program