It’s an adjective; it means able to adjust to new conditions or capable of being modified for a new purpose. It can be applied to both people and objects and some authorities say that being adaptable, able to cope with changing conditions, is why humans are the dominant life form on earth.
It is frequently used in the workplace to describe someone who can handle anything and is capable of taking on the jobs that would have others scratching their heads until they got splinters under their fingers. It is also used to describe members of the British armed forces, one reason, perhaps, why they are the best in the world.
1) The period of time needed to familiarize oneself with a new electronic device.
2) Often, a period of extreme anxiety and frustration stemming from one's need to learn a lot of technical information in a short to non-existent period of time.
1) "I'm sorry, Joe. I won't be in to work today. I'm exhausted from staying up all night learning how to use my new i-phone and am suffering this morning from a bad case of contraption adaption."
2) "I'm now limiting my persuit of new e-toys to only those gadgets with a low level of contraption adaption."
3) The salesguy said: "If you buy this new Mac laptop today, I guarantee you'll start using it today." "Yeah, sure", I said. "I'll BET there's no contraption adaption for THIS machine!"