sleep
1. To relinquish a claim (of a process on a
{multitasking} system) for service; to indicate to the
scheduler that a process may be deactivated until some given
event occurs or a specified time delay elapses.
2. In jargon, used very similarly to v. {block}; also in
"sleep on", synonym with "block on". Often used to indicate
that the speaker has relinquished a demand for resources until
some (possibly unspecified) external event: "They can't get
the fix I've been asking for into the next release, so I'm
going to sleep on it until the release, then start hassling
them again."
3. To go into partial deactivation to save power.
[{Jargon File}]
(1997-11-23)