starvation

n. suffering or death caused by having nothing to eat for a long time.

n. the state of suffering or death caused by a lack of food. Uncountable in its general sense, though countable when referring to specific instances of famine.

“The charity is working hard to save thousands of people from starvation after the crops failed.”

“The prolonged siege reduced the city's population to the brink of starvation, forcing the local authorities to appeal for international humanitarian intervention.”

n. a situation where there is not enough of something important, like money or information.

n. a severe shortage or deprivation of necessary resources other than food. Often used figuratively to describe institutional or emotional lack.

“The school suffered from a starvation of funds, so they couldn't buy new books.”

“The research department complained of a starvation of data, arguing that without more primary sources, the study could not reach a valid conclusion.”

Formal

n. when a computer program cannot finish its work because it is waiting for something it needs.

n. a state in which a process is perpetually denied the necessary resources to complete its task, often due to scheduling algorithms prioritising other tasks.

“The system slowed down because one small task was suffering from starvation.”

“To prevent process starvation, the operating system employs a fair-share scheduling algorithm that ensures every thread eventually receives a slice of CPU time.”

Technical