Trying to think of a word or short phrase to describe something as being secondary but without implying that it is unimportant.
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Words like supporting and ancillary and the like can describe necessary members, but relative importance will always be in the eye of the beholder.– RobustoCommented Feb 4, 2015 at 17:13
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2How do you intend to use this word? Secondary does not imply unimportant, just not as important as the primary.– HellionCommented Feb 4, 2015 at 17:14
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Also, please see english.stackexchange.com/tags/single-word-requests/info for information on how to ask a good single-word-request question.– HellionCommented Feb 4, 2015 at 17:15
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In a restaurant, the appearance of the food is next in importance to its taste and quality.– WS2Commented Feb 4, 2015 at 17:22
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One thing to consider is the context you set up: if you imply that the first item you mention is the most important you'll get bogged down trying to justify why the second isn't secondary. If instead you start out by saying there are "2 key factors" (or something like that) of which you'll address the "simpler (but not the more important)" first you'll have no trouble getting your point across.– Chris HCommented Feb 4, 2015 at 20:19
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2 Answers
You have the right word, why look further...
"Secondary” without implying a lack of importance would be context/situation dependent.
Since second is a form of the number two, Secondary implies - must be done next.
Something secondary is second most important.
However, when you say- "This is my target. Everything else is secondary." It can also refer to things that are not important at all.
accompanying:
http://www.thesaurus.com/browse/accompanying
ancillary:
http://www.thesaurus.com/browse/ancillary
additional:
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Judging by the part of speech, I imagine you meant “additional”. Commented Feb 4, 2015 at 22:00
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In that case, you should edit your post with the correction. Commented Feb 5, 2015 at 14:50