procedure

Etymology

From French procédure, from Old French, from Latin procedere (“to go forward, proceed”); see proceed.

noun

1. A particular method for performing a task.
   One of the hidden glories of Victorian engineering is proper drains. Isolating a city’s effluent and shipping it away in underground sewers has probably saved more lives than any medical procedure except vaccination. 2014-06-14, “It's a gas”, in The Economist, volume 411, number 8891
2. A series of small tasks or steps taken to accomplish an end.
3. (uncountable) The set of established forms or methods of an organized body for accomplishing a certain task or tasks.
   Ensure that you follow procedure when accessing customers' personal information.
4. The steps taken in an action or other legal proceeding.
5. (obsolete) That which results; issue; product.
6. (computing) A subroutine or function coded to perform a specific task, but does not return a value.
7. (medicine) A surgical operation.