A process is a series or set of activities that interact to produce a result; it may occur once-only or be recurrent or periodic. Things called a process include:

Business and management

Business process A business process, business method or business function is a collection of related, structured activities or tasks by people or equipment in which a specific sequence produces a service or product (serves a particular business goal) for a parti ...

, activities that produce a specific service or product for customers *

Business process modeling Business process modeling (BPM) in business process management and systems engineering is the activity of process modeling, representing processes of an enterprise, so that the current business processes may be analyzed, improved, and automated. B ...

, activity of representing processes of an enterprise in order to deliver improvements *

Manufacturing process management Manufacturing process management (MPM) is a collection of technologies and methods used to define how products are to be manufactured. MPM differs from ERP/MRP which is used to plan the ordering of materials and other resources, set manufacturing ...

, a collection of technologies and methods used to define how products are to be manufactured. *

Process architecture Process architecture is the structural design of general process systems. It applies to fields such as computers (software, hardware, networks, etc.), business processes ( enterprise architecture, policy and procedures, logistics, project managemen ...

, structural design of processes, applies to fields such as computers, business processes, logistics, project management *Process costing, a cost allocation procedure of

managerial accounting In management accounting or managerial accounting, managers use accounting information in decision-making and to assist in the management and performance of their control functions. Definition One simple definition of management accounting is t ...

* Process management, ensemble of activities of planning and monitoring the performance of a business process or manufacturing processes *

Process management (project management) In civil engineering and project management, process management is the management of "systematic series of activities directed towards causing an end result such that one or more inputs will be acted upon to create one or more outputs".PMI (2012), ...

, a systematic series of activities directed towards causing an end result in engineering activities or project management *

Process-based management Process-based management is a management approach that views a business as a collection of processes, managed to achieve a desired result."''Process-based Management''" Barron's Business Guides: Dictionary of Accounting Terms, Jae K. Shim et al., B ...

, is a management approach that views a business as a collection of processes *

Process industry Industrial processes are procedures involving chemical, physical, electrical or mechanical steps to aid in the manufacturing of an item or items, usually carried out on a very large scale. Industrial processes are the key components of heavy ind ...

, a category of material-related industry

Law

Due process Due process of law is application by state of all legal rules and principles pertaining to the case so all legal rights that are owed to the person are respected. Due process balances the power of law of the land and protects the individual pers ...

, the concept that governments must respect the rule of law *

Legal process Legal process (sometimes simply process) is any formal notice or writ by a court obtaining jurisdiction over a person or property. Common forms of process include a summons, subpoena, mandate, and warrant. Process normally takes effect by ...

, the proceedings and records of a legal case *

Service of process Service of process is the procedure by which a party to a lawsuit gives an appropriate notice of initial legal action to another party (such as a defendant), court, or administrative body in an effort to exercise jurisdiction over that person s ...

, the procedure of giving official notice of a legal proceeding

Science and technology

*The general concept of the scientific process, see

scientific method The scientific method is an empirical method for acquiring knowledge that has characterized the development of science since at least the 17th century (with notable practitioners in previous centuries; see the article history of scientific m ...

Process theory A process theory is a system of ideas that explains how an entity changes and develops. Process theories are often contrasted with variance theories, that is, systems of ideas that explain the variance in a dependent variable based on one or more ...

, the scientific study of processes * Consists of the purposeful sequencing of tasks that combine resources to produce a desired output

Biology and psychology

Process (anatomy) In anatomy, a process ( la, processus) is a projection or outgrowth of tissue from a larger body. For instance, in a vertebra, a process may serve for muscle attachment and leverage (as in the case of the transverse and spinous processes), or to ...

, a projection or outgrowth of tissue from a larger body *

Biological process Biological processes are those processes that are vital for an organism to live, and that shape its capacities for interacting with its environment. Biological processes are made of many chemical reactions or other events that are involved in the ...

, a process of a living organism *

Cognitive process Cognition refers to "the mental action or process of acquiring knowledge and understanding through thought, experience, and the senses". It encompasses all aspects of intellectual functions and processes such as: perception, attention, thought, ...

, such as attention, memory, language use, reasoning, and problem solving *

Mental process Cognition refers to "the mental action or process of acquiring knowledge and understanding through thought, experience, and the senses". It encompasses all aspects of intellectual functions and processes such as: perception, attention, thought, ...

, a function or processes of the mind * Neuronal process, also ''neurite'', a projection from the cell body of a neuron

Chemistry

Chemical process In a scientific sense, a chemical process is a method or means of somehow changing one or more chemicals or chemical compounds. Such a chemical process can occur by itself or be caused by an outside force, and involves a chemical reaction of some ...

, a method or means of changing one or more chemicals or chemical compounds *

Unit process A ''unit process'' is one or more grouped operations in a manufacturing system that can be defined and separated from others. In life-cycle assessment (LCA) and ISO 14040, a unit process is defined as "smallest element considered in the life cycle ...

, a step in manufacturing in which chemical reaction takes place

Computing

Process (computing) In computing, a process is the instance of a computer program that is being executed by one or many threads. There are many different process models, some of which are light weight, but almost all processes (even entire virtual machines) are r ...

, a computer program, or running a program concurrently with other programs **

Child process A child process in computing is a process created by another process (the parent process). This technique pertains to multitasking operating systems, and is sometimes called a subprocess or traditionally a subtask. There are two major procedures ...

, created by another process **

Parent process In computing, a parent process is a process that has created one or more child processes. Unix-like systems In Unix-like operating systems, every process except (the swapper) is created when another process executes the fork() system call. Th ...

Process management (computing) A process is a program in execution, and an integral part of any modern-day operating system (OS). The OS must allocate resources to processes, enable processes to share and exchange information, protect the resources of each process from other pro ...

, an integral part of any modern-day operating system (OS) *

Processing (programming language) Processing is a free graphical library and integrated development environment (IDE) built for the electronic arts, new media art, and visual design communities with the purpose of teaching non-programmers the fundamentals of computer programming ...

, an open-source language and integrated development environment

Mathematics

*In

probability theory Probability theory is the branch of mathematics concerned with probability. Although there are several different probability interpretations, probability theory treats the concept in a rigorous mathematical manner by expressing it through a set o ...

: **

Branching process In probability theory, a branching process is a type of mathematical object known as a stochastic process, which consists of collections of random variables. The random variables of a stochastic process are indexed by the natural numbers. The origi ...

, a Markov process that models a population **

Diffusion process In probability theory and statistics, diffusion processes are a class of continuous-time Markov process with almost surely continuous sample paths. Brownian motion, reflected Brownian motion and Ornstein–Uhlenbeck processes are examples of diff ...

, a solution to a stochastic differential equation **

Empirical process In probability theory, an empirical process is a stochastic process that describes the proportion of objects in a system in a given state. For a process in a discrete state space a population continuous time Markov chain or Markov population model ...

, a stochastic process that describes the proportion of objects in a system in a given state **

Lévy process In probability theory, a Lévy process, named after the French mathematician Paul Lévy, is a stochastic process with independent, stationary increments: it represents the motion of a point whose successive displacements are random, in which disp ...

, a stochastic process with independent, stationary increments **

Poisson process In probability, statistics and related fields, a Poisson point process is a type of random mathematical object that consists of points randomly located on a mathematical space with the essential feature that the points occur independently of one ...

, a point process consisting of randomly located points on some underlying space **

Predictable process In stochastic analysis, a part of the mathematical theory of probability, a predictable process is a stochastic process whose value is knowable at a prior time. The predictable processes form the smallest class that is closed under taking limits of ...

, a stochastic process whose value is knowable **

Stochastic process In probability theory and related fields, a stochastic () or random process is a mathematical object usually defined as a family of random variables. Stochastic processes are widely used as mathematical models of systems and phenomena that appea ...

, a random process, as opposed to a deterministic process **

Wiener process In mathematics, the Wiener process is a real-valued continuous-time stochastic process named in honor of American mathematician Norbert Wiener for his investigations on the mathematical properties of the one-dimensional Brownian motion. It is o ...

, a continuous-time stochastic process *

Process calculus In computer science, the process calculi (or process algebras) are a diverse family of related approaches for formally modelling concurrent systems. Process calculi provide a tool for the high-level description of interactions, communications, and ...

, a diverse family of related approaches for formally modeling concurrent systems *

Process function In thermodynamics, a quantity that is well defined so as to describe the path of a process through the equilibrium state space of a thermodynamic system is termed a process function, or, alternatively, a process quantity, or a path function. As ...

, a mathematical concept used in thermodynamics

Thermodynamics

, a mathematical concept used in thermodynamics *

Thermodynamic process Classical thermodynamics considers three main kinds of thermodynamic process: (1) changes in a system, (2) cycles in a system, and (3) flow processes. (1)A Thermodynamic process is a process in which the thermodynamic state of a system is change ...

, the energetic evolution of a thermodynamic system **

Adiabatic process In thermodynamics, an adiabatic process (Greek: ''adiábatos'', "impassable") is a type of thermodynamic process that occurs without transferring heat or mass between the thermodynamic system and its environment. Unlike an isothermal process, ...

, which proceeds without transfer of heat or matter between a system and its surroundings **

Isenthalpic process An isenthalpic process or isoenthalpic process is a process that proceeds without any change in enthalpy, ''H''; or specific enthalpy, ''h''. Overview If a steady-state, steady-flow process is analysed using a control volume, everything outside ...

, in which enthalpy stays constant **

Isobaric process In thermodynamics, an isobaric process is a type of thermodynamic process in which the pressure of the system stays constant: Δ''P'' = 0. The heat transferred to the system does work, but also changes the internal energy (''U'') of t ...

, in which the pressure stays constant **

Isochoric process In thermodynamics, an isochoric process, also called a constant-volume process, an isovolumetric process, or an isometric process, is a thermodynamic process during which the volume of the closed system undergoing such a process remains constant ...

, in which volume stays constant **

Isothermal process In thermodynamics, an isothermal process is a type of thermodynamic process in which the temperature ''T'' of a system remains constant: Δ''T'' = 0. This typically occurs when a system is in contact with an outside thermal reservoir, and ...

, in which temperature stays constant **

Polytropic process A polytropic process is a thermodynamic process that obeys the relation: p V^ = C where ''p'' is the pressure, ''V'' is volume, ''n'' is the polytropic index, and ''C'' is a constant. The polytropic process equation describes expansion and comp ...

, which obeys the equation

p v^ = C

Quasistatic process In thermodynamics, a quasi-static process (also known as a quasi-equilibrium process; from the Latin ''quasi'', meaning ‘as if’), is a thermodynamic process that happens slowly enough for the system to remain in internal physical (but not ne ...

, which occurs infinitely slowly, as an approximation

Other uses

*The Process, a concept in the film '' 3%'' *

Food processing Food processing is the transformation of agricultural products into food, or of one form of food into other forms. Food processing includes many forms of processing foods, from grinding grain to make raw flour to home cooking to complex industr ...

, transformation of raw ingredients, by physical or chemical means into food *

Language processing in the brain Language processing refers to the way humans use words to communicate ideas and feelings, and how such communications are processed and understood. Language processing is considered to be a uniquely human ability that is not produced with the sa ...

Natural language processing Natural language processing (NLP) is an interdisciplinary subfield of linguistics, computer science, and artificial intelligence concerned with the interactions between computers and human language, in particular how to program computers to pro ...

Praxis (process) Praxis (from grc, πρᾶξις, translit=praxis) is the process by which a theory, lesson, or skill is enacted, embodied, or realized. "Praxis" may also refer to the act of engaging, applying, exercising, realizing, or practising ideas. This has ...

, in philosophy, the process by which a theory or skill is enacted or realized *

Process (engineering) In engineering, a process is a series of interrelated tasks that, together, transform inputs into a given output. These tasks may be carried out by people, nature or machines using various resources; an engineering process must be considered in t ...

, set of interrelated tasks that transform inputs into outputs *

Process philosophy Process philosophy, also ontology of becoming, or processism, is an approach to philosophy that identifies processes, changes, or shifting relationships as the only true elements of the ordinary, everyday real world. In opposition to the classic ...

, which regards change as the cornerstone of reality *

Process thinking Process thinking, also known as "the process", is a philosophy that emphasizes preparation and hard work over consideration of outcomes or results, and is particularly popular in professional sports.St. John, WarreNick Saban: Sympathy for the Devi ...

, a philosophy that focuses on present circumstances *

Writing process A writing process describes a sequence of physical and mental actions that people take as they produce any kind of text. These actions nearly universally involve tools for physical or digital inscription: e.g., chisels, pencils, brushes, chalk, di ...

, a concept in writing and composition studies

External links

* * *{{Wiktionary-inline, processing Business process Business process management Process engineering Industrial processes Technology-related lists Legal procedure Biological processes Chemical processes Process (computing)