batch

Noun · Verb

Synonyms: deal flock good deal great deal hatful heap lot mass mess mickle mint mountain

WordNet 3.0

Noun (3)

all the loaves of bread baked at the same time
(often followed by `of') a large number or amount or extent“a batch of letters”“a deal of trouble”“a lot of money”“he made a mint on the stock market”“see the rest of the winners in our huge passel of photos”“it must have cost plenty”“a slew of journalists”“a wad of money”Synonyms: deal flock good deal great deal hatful heap lot mass mess mickle mint mountain muckle passel peck pile plenty pot quite a little raft sight slew spate stack tidy sum wad
a collection of things or persons to be handled togetherSynonyms: clutch

Verb (1)

batch together; assemble or process as a batch

Webster's Dictionary (GCIDE)

Batch \Batch\, n. [OE. bache, bacche, fr. AS. bacan to bake; cf. G. geb[aum]ck and D. baksel. See Bake, v. t.] [1913 Webster]

1.The quantity of bread baked at one time. [1913 Webster]

2.A quantity of anything produced at one operation; a group or collection of persons or things of the same kind; as, a batch of letters; the next batch of business. "A new batch of Lords." --Lady M. W. Montagu. [1913 Webster]

Free On-line Dictionary of Computing

batch processing batch

<programming> A system that takes a sequence (a "batch") of commands or jobs, executes them and returns the results, all without human intervention. This contrasts with an interactive system where the user's commands and the computer's responses are interleaved during a single run.

A batch system typically takes its commands from a disk file (or a set of punched cards or magnetic tape in the mainframe days) and returns the results to a file (or prints them). Often there is a queue of jobs which the system processes as resources become available.

Since the advent of the personal computer, the term "batch" has come to mean automating frequently performed tasks that would otherwise be done interactively by storing those commands in a "batch file" or "script". Usually this file is read by some kind of command interpreter but batch processing is sometimes used with GUI-based applications that define script equivalents for menu selections and other mouse actions. Such a recorded sequence of GUI actions is sometimes called a "macro". This may only exist in memory and may not be saved to disk whereas a batch normally implies something stored on disk.

Unix cron jobs and Windows scheduled tasks are batch processing started at a predefined time by the system whereas mainframe batch jobs were typically initiated by an operator loading them into a queue.

(2009-09-14)

The Jargon File

batch adj.

1.Non-interactive. Hackers use this somewhat more loosely than the traditional technical definitions justify; in particular, switches on a normally interactive program that prepare it to receive non-interactive command input are often referred to as batch mode switches. A batch file is a series of instructions written to be handed to an interactive program running in batch mode.

2.Performance of dreary tasks all at one sitting. “I finally sat down in batch mode and wrote out checks for all those bills; I guess they'll turn the electricity back on next week...”

3.batching up: Accumulation of a number of small tasks that can be lumped together for greater efficiency. “I'm batching up those letters to send sometime” “I'm batching up bottles to take to the recycling center.” [crunchly-2]