# queue

Pronunciation: say "KYOO" US /kju/, UK /kjuː/

## Noun

1. A line or ordered list of people, vehicles, or things waiting to be dealt with in turn, usually in the order they arrive. *(Commonwealth, Ireland, UK)*
   - Simple: A line or list of people or things waiting their turn.
   - _The queue for the ticket office stretched right round the station._
   - _Lorries sat in long queues at the port while customs checked every load._
4. In computing, a data structure in which items are added at one end, the tail, and removed from the other, the head, so the first item added is the first removed.
   - Simple: In computing, a list where new items join the end and the one that has waited longest comes out first.
   - _The print server places incoming jobs in a queue and sends them to the printer one at a time._
   - _Incoming requests wait in a message queue until a worker process is free._
6. A men's hairstyle in which the hair is gathered into a braid or ponytail at the back of the head, such as that worn in Imperial China or in 18th-century Europe.
   - Simple: A long braid or ponytail at the back of a man's head, worn in the past.
   - _Under the old law, every man in the province had to shave his forehead and wear a queue._
   - _The colonel tied his powdered hair back in a neat queue with a black ribbon._

## Verb

2. To wait in a line of people or vehicles for your turn, joining it at the end; of a group, to form such a line, often with up. *(UK, Ireland, Commonwealth)*
   - Simple: To stand in a line and wait for your turn.
   - _Fans queued overnight to get the first tickets._
   - _Please queue at the side door if you have already booked._
3. To set up a series of songs, videos, tasks or other items to be played or processed in turn, often followed by up.
   - Simple: To put songs, videos, jobs or other things in order so they play or get done one after another.
   - _Editors can queue up posts to publish automatically over the weekend._
   - _Before the party, I'll queue a few hours of dance music on my phone._
5. In computing, to add an item to a queue data structure.
   - Simple: In computing, to add something to a queue.
   - _The scheduler queues each task as soon as it arrives._
   - _Developers often queue background jobs so the website stays fast._
7. To enter the matchmaking system of an online video game and wait until it places you in a match with other players.
   - Simple: In an online game, to ask for a match and wait while the game finds other players.
   - _Let's queue for a few ranked matches before the servers go down for maintenance._
   - _He queued as a healer to shorten the wait, and the game found him a match within seconds._

## Other meanings

- (noun) In heraldry, the tail of an animal depicted on a coat of arms.
- (verb) To gather and fasten the hair into a braid or tail at the back of the head.

## Origin

Latin cauda became Vulgar Latin cōda, which led to Old French cöe or cue, "tail," and to Anglo-Norman queue. Middle English took the word as queue. Coda and cola are doublets.

Source: DictionaryAI, https://dictionaryai.com/define/queue (written from Wiktionary data, CC BY-SA 4.0: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/).