Queue vs Wait - What's the difference?
queue | wait |
(heraldry) An animal's tail.
* 1863 , Charles Boutell, A Manual of Heraldry , p. 369:
* 1889 , (Arthur Conan Doyle), Micah Clarke , :
* 1912 , :
* 1967 , William Styron, The Confessions of Nat Turner , Vintage 2004, p. 176:
A line of people, vehicles or other objects, in which one at the front end is t with first, the one behind is dealt with next, and so on, and which newcomers join at the opposite end (the back).
* 1916 , ,
A waiting list or other means of organizing people or objects into a first-come-first-served order.
(computing) A data structure in which objects are added to one end, called the tail, and removed from the other, called the head (- a FIFO queue). The term can also refer to a LIFO queue or stack where these ends coincide.
* 2005 , David Flanagan, Java in a Nutshell , p. 234,
(British) To put oneself or itself at the end of a waiting line.
(British) To arrange themselves into a physical waiting queue.
(computing) To add to a queue data structure.
To fasten the hair into a queue.
* 1968 , Francis Russell, The American Heritage History of the Making of the Nation
* 1820 , Washington Irving, The Legend of Sleepy Hollow
To delay movement or action until the arrival or occurrence of; to await. (Now generally superseded by "wait for".)
* Dryden
* 1992 , (Hilary Mantel), A Place of Greater Safety , Harper Perennial 2007, p. 30:
To delay movement or action until some event or time; to remain neglected or in readiness.
* (John Milton)
* (John Dryden)
*
, title=(The Celebrity), chapter=4
, passage=No matter how early I came down, I would find him on the veranda, smoking cigarettes, or otherwise his man would be there with a message to say that his master would shortly join me if I would kindly wait .}}
(US) To wait tables; to serve customers in a restaurant or other eating establishment.
(obsolete) To attend on; to accompany; especially, to attend with ceremony or respect.
* Dryden
* Rowe
(obsolete) To attend as a consequence; to follow upon; to accompany.
(obsolete) To defer or postpone (a meal).
A delay.
An ambush.
* Milton
(obsolete) One who watches; a watchman.
(in the plural, obsolete, UK) Hautboys, or oboes, played by town musicians.
(in the plural, archaic, UK) Musicians who sing or play at night or in the early morning, especially at Christmas time; serenaders; musical watchmen. [formerly waites, wayghtes.]
* (rfdate)
* (rfdate)
As nouns the difference between queue and wait
is that queue is an animal's tail while wait is a delay.As verbs the difference between queue and wait
is that queue is to put oneself or itself at the end of a waiting line while wait is to delay movement or action until the arrival or occurrence of; to await. (Now generally superseded by "wait for"..queue
English
(wikipedia queue)Noun
(en noun)- 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.
- , 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.
- 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,
- 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 [...].
- I was absent-minded at the moment and was last in the queue .
- 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).
Synonyms
* line (North America)Derived terms
* double-ended queue * queueing theory * queue-jump * jump the queueVerb
- Though Monroe the man has become a vague anachronistic figure in knee breeches and with queued , powdered hair, his name is perpetuated in the Monroe Doctrine, evoked by him as a temporary response to an immediate crisis.
- The sons, in short square skirted coats with rows of stupendous brass buttons, and their hair generally queued in the fashion of the times, especially if they could procure an eel skin for the purpose, it being esteemed throughout the country as potent nourisher and strengthener of the hair.
Synonyms
* (place itself at the end of a queue) join a queue, join the queue, line upDerived terms
* dequeue * enqueue * queue upSee also
* FIFO * LIFO * cue ----wait
English
Alternative forms
* (l)Verb
(en verb)- Awed with these words, in camps they still abide, / And wait with longing looks their promised guide.
- The Court had assembled, to wait events, in the huge antechamber known as the Œil de Boeuf.
- They also serve who only stand and wait .
- Haste, my dear father; 'tis no time to wait .
- He chose a thousand horse, the flower of all / His warlike troops, to wait the funeral.
- Remorse and heaviness of heart shall wait thee, / And everlasting anguish be thy portion.
- to wait dinner
Usage notes
* In sense 1, this is a catenative verb that takes the to infinitive . SeeSynonyms
* (delay until event) hold one's breathDerived terms
* can't wait * wait staff * wait state * wait for * wait on * wait tables * waiter * waiting room * waitperson * waitress * waitronNoun
(en noun)- I had a very long wait at the airport security check.
- They laid in wait for the patrol.
- an enemy in wait
- (Halliwell)
- Hark! are the waits abroad?
- The sound of the waits , rude as may be their minstrelsy, breaks upon the mild watches of a winter night with the effect of perfect harmony.