queue
Language: English
Part of speech: noun
Pronunciation: ipa: /kjuː/
enpr: kyo͞o
ipa: /kju/
rhymes: -uː
homophone: cue
homophone: Kew
homophone: kyu
homophone: Q
homophone: que
Forms: form: queues
Etymology: From Middle English queue, quew, qwew, couwe, from Anglo-Norman queue, keu and Old French cöe, cue, coe (“tail”), from Vulgar Latin cōda, from Latin cauda. See also Middle French queu, cueue. Doublet of coda and cola.
Senses: examples: text: I was absent-minded at the moment and was last in the queue.
ref: 1916, John Buchan, “Chapter 5”, in Greenmantle:
text: In a report published on October 31, Transport Focus said that a number of train companies were unable to convince it about their ability to sell a full range of tickets, handle cash payments, and avoid excessive queues at ticket machines.
ref: 2023 November 15, 'Industry Insider', “Outbreak of common sense”, in RAIL, number 996, page 68:
glosses: A line of people, vehicles or other objects, usually one to be dealt with in sequence (i.e., the one at the front end is dealt with first, the one behind is dealt with next, and so on), and which newcomers join at the opposite end (the back).
raw_tags: in North America
glosses: A waiting list or other means of organizing people or objects into a first-come-first-served order.
examples: 2005, David Flanagan, Java in a Nutshell, p. 234,
Queue implementations are commonly based on insertion order as in first-in, first-out (FIFO) queues or last-in, first-out queues (LIFO queues are also known as stacks).
topics: computing
engineering
mathematics
natural-sciences
physical-sciences
sciences
glosses: A data structure in which objects are added to one end, called the tail, and removed from the other, called the head (in the case of a FIFO queue). The term can also refer to a LIFO queue or stack where these ends coincide.
examples: text: HESSE: Az., a lion, queue fourchée, rampt., barry of ten, arg. and gu., crowned, or, and holding in his dexter paw a sword, ppr., hilt and pommel, gold.
ref: 1863, Charles Boutell, A Manual of Heraldry, page 369:
topics: government
heraldry
hobbies
lifestyle
monarchy
nobility
politics
glosses: An animal's tail.
examples: text: […], there were seated astraddle the whole hundred of the baronet's musqueteers, each engaged in plaiting into a queue the hair of the man who sat in front of him.
ref: 1889, A[rthur] Conan Doyle, chapter XIX, in Micah Clarke: […], London: Longmans, Green, and Co […], →OCLC:
text: A large number of loyal officials, rather than shave the front part of the head and wear the Manchu queue, voluntarily shaved the whole head, […]
ref: 1912, Herbert Allen Giles, China and the Manchus, Chapter III — Shun Chih
text: Caparisoned for a week in purple velvet knee-length pantaloons, a red silk jacket with buckles of shiny brass, and a white goat's-hair wig which culminated behind in a saucy queue, I must have presented an exotic sight […]
ref: 1967, William Styron, The Confessions of Nat Turner, Vintage, published 2004, page 176:
glosses: A men's hairstyle with a braid or ponytail at the back of the head, such as that worn by men in Imperial China.
Synonyms: sense: line of people, vehicles, etc
word: line
sense: line of people, vehicles, etc
word: lineup
word: queue
Hyponyms: word: circular queue
word: dole queue
word: double-ended queue
word: message queue
word: priority queue
word: reference queue
word: breadline
word: stack
word: traffic jam
Derived terms: batch queue
cue
job queue
jump queue
jump the queue
poison queue
queueing theory
queue-jump
queue-jumper
ready queue
Related terms: caudal
quevée