Batching

Part of speech: verb

Pronunciation: /ˈbæt͡ʃɪŋ/

Definitions

1. The method of grouping several units for simultaneous processing A technique for organizing items to optimize production workflow The practice of compiling collections of items to facilitate efficient handling
2. The process of assembling multiple elements together for handling at the same time
3. An approach that involves collecting units into a set to be dealt with collectively

Etymology: The most surprising thing about "batching" is that its root has nothing to do with groups of goods at all. The noun "batch" began in Old English as "bæċċ," meaning "something baked," from the same stock as "bake." A batch was simply the amount of dough or bread that came out of the oven at one time, and that baking sense of a single portion is the seed of the modern idea of grouping things together to process them as a unit. Over the centuries the word broadened from baked loaves to any quantity produced or handled at once. The industrial and manufacturing sense that now dominates, a set of items processed in one run, grew out of that older idea of a single oven-load. "Batching" is simply the verb form built on that noun, describing the act of collecting items into such groups.

Synonyms: grouping, collecting, assembling, gathering, sorting

Antonyms: dispersing, scattering, separating, dividing, isolating