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say it: ah-pur-AY-shuhn
operation is a noun meaning "the state of being in effect or being operative". It carries 11 recorded senses.
the state of being in effect or being operative
“that rule is no longer in operation”
a business especially one run on a large scale
“a large-scale farming operation”
“a multinational operation”
“they paid taxes on every stage of the operation”
“they had to consolidate their operations”
a planned activity involving many people performing various actions
“they organized a rescue operation”
“the biggest police operation in French history”
“running a restaurant is quite an operation”
“consolidate the companies various operations”
(computer science) data processing in which the result is completely specified by a rule (especially the processing that results from a single instruction)
“it can perform millions of operations per second”
computer science
activity by a military or naval force (as a maneuver or campaign)
“it was a joint operation of the navy and air force”
military
a medical procedure involving an incision with instruments; performed to repair damage or arrest disease in a living body
“they will schedule the operation as soon as an operating room is available”
“he died while undergoing surgery”
surgery
process or manner of functioning or operating
“the power of its engine determines its operation”
“the plane's operation in high winds”
“they compared the cooking performance of each oven”
“the jet's performance conformed to high standards”
(psychology) the performance of some composite cognitive activity; an operation that affects mental contents
“the process of thinking”
“the cognitive operation of remembering”
psychology
(mathematics) calculation by mathematical methods
“the problems at the end of the chapter demonstrated the mathematical processes involved in the derivation”
“they were learning the basic operations of arithmetic”
mathematics
the activity of operating something (a machine or business etc.)
“her smooth operation of the vehicle gave us a surprisingly comfortable ride”
commercial enterprise
Forms marked · are formed by the regular rule rather than recorded in the source data. English keeps a few hundred irregulars and the rest follow the pattern, so the rule is right far more often than not — but it is a rule, and the mark says so.
Definitions, synonyms and semantic relations for operation come from Princeton University’s WordNet. The pronunciation comes from the CMU Pronouncing Dictionary. Commonness is measured against a corpus of everyday English. Full sources and licences.