Other forms: processes, processing, processed
A process is a series of steps that leads from a start to a finish. The application process, a slow process, the whole process takes a fortnight.
The verb has three quite separate jobs. To process an application is to work through it; to process food is to treat it industrially, which is where processed food comes from; and to process information is what a mind or a computer does. Note that in the sense of walking in a formal line — a procession — the verb is stressed differently, pro-CESS, and is rare. And in the process is a very useful connector meaning while doing it.
1nounprocessA series of steps leading to a result.
“The whole process takes about six weeks.”
2verbdealTo deal with something officially, step by step.
“They processed four hundred applications in a month.”
3verbtreatTo treat food or material industrially.
“Heavily processed food is cheap and does not fill you up.”
Too few real examples of this word to estimate which sense is commonest.
process is a series of steps.
Latin processus meant an advance or progression, from procedere, to go forward — the same verb behind proceed and procedure. A process is a going forward, and the word says nothing about the steps being written down.
Proto-Indo-European
*per-
Latin
prōcessus — course, progression
Old French
procés — journey
Middle English
proces
English, today
process
Built from
From Middle English proces, from Old French procés (“journey”), from Latin prōcessus (“course, progression”), nominalization of prōcēdō (“proceed, advance”).
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA